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THE   CROWN    OF   THORNS. 


THE 


CROWN    OF    THORNS. 


I  i^fe^ 


THE     SORROWING. 


E.    H.    CITAPIN. 


BOSTON: 
PUBI.TSFTKD    BY  A.   TOMPKINS, 

38     &     40     COBNHILL. 

1800. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1860,  Jiy 

A.     TOMPKINS, 

In  tlie  Clerk's  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  tlie  District  of  Mabsachusettii. 


BiU^rd  P.  Fox  and  Dilllnsbuii  *  Bn^, 
41  Caniraa  St..  BMton. 


PRIXTEU  BT 
CEonOE    C.     RAND    &     AVERV. 


PREFACE. 


One  of  the  discourses  in  this  volume  —  "  The  Mis- 
sion of  Little  Children  "  —  was  written  just  after  the 
death  of  a  dear  son,  and  was  published  in  pamphlet 
form.  The  edition  having  become  exhausted  sooner 
than  the  demand,  it  was  deemed  advisable  to  reprint 
it ;  and  accordingly  it  is  now  presented  to  the  reader, 
accompanied  by  others  of  a  similar  cast,  most  of  them 
growing  out  of  the  same  experience.  This  fact  will 
account  for  any  repetition  of  sentiment  which  may 
appear  in  these  discourses,  especially  as  they  were 
written  without  any  reference  to  one  another. 

To  the  sorrowing,  then,  this  little  volume  is  ten- 
dered, with  the  author's  sympathy  and  aflfection. 
Upon  its  pages  he  has  poured  out  some  of  the  senti- 
ments of  his  own  heartfelt  experience,  knowing  that 
they  will  find  a  response  in  theirs,  and  hoping  that 
the  book  may  do  a  work  of  consolation  and  of  healing. 
If  it  impresses  upon  any  the  general  sentiment  which 


yi  PREFACE. 

it  contains,  —  the  sentiment  of  religious  resignation 
and  triumph  in  affliction  ;  if  it  shall  cause  any  tearful 
vision  to  take  the  Christian  view  of  sorrow ;  if  it  shall 
teach  any  troubled  soul  to  endure  and  hope;  if  it 
shall  lead  any  weary  spirit  to  the  Fountain  of  consola- 
tion ;  in  one  word,  if  it  shall  help  any,  by  Christ's 
strength,  to  weave  the  thorns  that  wound  them  into  a 
crown,  I  shall  be  richly  rewarded,  and,  I  trust,  grate- 
ful to  that  God  to  whose  service  I  dedicate  this  book, 

invoking  his  blessing  upon  it. 

E.  H.  C. 

May,  1860. 


CONTENTS. 


THE  THREE  TABERNACLES, 11 

THE  SHADOW  OF  DISAI'POINT.MKNX 41 

LIFE  A  TALE, (57 

THE  CHRISTIAN  VIEW  OF  SORROW, 99 

CIIUISTIAN  CONSOLATION  IN  LONELINESS 121 

RESIGN  ATION, 143 

THE  MISSION  OF  LirfLE  CHILDREN, 167 

OLR  RELATIONS  TO  THE  DEPARTED, 191 

THE  VOICES  OF  THE  DEAD, ZIS 

MYSTERY  AND  FAITH, 243 


SD^e  C^ree  Cabtrnatb. 


And  Peter  answered  and  said  to  Jesus,  Master,  it  is  good  for  us  to  be 
bere  :  and  let  us  make  three  tabernacles  ;  one  for  thee,  and  one  for  Moses, 
and  one  for  Elias.    Mark  ix.  5. 


AUGHT  up  in  glory  and  in  rapture,  the 
Apostle  seems  to  have  forgotten  the  world 
from  -which  he  had  ascended,  and  to  which  he 
still  belonged,  and  to  have  craved  permanent  shel- 
ter and  extatic  communion  within  the  mystic 
splendors  that  brightened  the  Mount  of  Trans- 
figuration. But  it  was  true,  not  only  as  to  the 
confusion  of  his  faculties,  but  the  purport  of  his 
desire,  that  "  he  knew  not  what  he  said."  For 
even  "  while  he  yet  spake,"  the  cloud  over- 
shadowed them,  the  heavenly  forms  vanished,  they 
found  themselves  with  Jesus  alone,  and  an  awful 


12  THE    THREE   TABERNACLES. 

Voice    summoned    them    from    contemplation   to 
dutj,  —  from  vision  to  work. 

Peter  knew  not  what  he  said.  He  would  have 
converted  the  means  into  an  end.  He  and  his 
fellow-disciples  had  been  called  to  follow  Christ 
not  that  they  might  see  visions,  but  had  been 
permitted  to  see  visions  that  they  might  follow 
Christ.  Just  previous  to  that  celestial  interview, 
Jesus  had  announced  to  them  his  own  painful 
doom,  and  had  swept  away  their  conceit  of  Mes- 
sianic glories  involved  with  earthly  pomp  and 
dominion,  by  his  declaration  of  the  self-denial, 
the  shame,  and  the  suffering  Avhich  lay  in  the 
path  of  those  who  really  espoused  his  cause  and 
entered  into  his  kingdom.  They  needed  such  a 
revelation  as  this,  then,  upon  the  Mount  of  Trans- 
figuration, to  support  them  under  the  stroke  which 
had  shaken  their  earthly  delusion,  and  let  in 
glimpses  of  the  sadder  truth.  It  was  well  that 
they  should  behold  the  leaders  of  the  old  dispen- 
sation confirming  and  ministering  to  the  greatness 


THE   THREE    TABERNACLES.  13 

of  the  new,  and  the  religion  which  was  to  go 
down  into  the  dark  places  of  the  earth  made 
manifest  in  its  authority  and  its  source  from 
Heaven.  It  was  well  that  they  should  see  their 
Master  glorified,  that  they  might  be  strengthened 
to  see  him  crucified.  It  was  well  that  Moses  and 
Elias  stood  at  the  font,  when  they  were  about  to 
be  baptized  into  their  apostleship  of  sufiering,  and 
labor,  and  helping  finish  the  work  Avhich  these 
glorious  elders  helped  begin.  But  that  great 
work  still  lay  before  them,  and  to  rest  here  Avould 
be  to  stop  upon  the  threshold ;  —  to  have  kept 
the  vision  would  have  thwarted  the  purpose. 
Upon  a  far  higher  summit,  and  at  a  far  distant 
time  —  with  fields  of  toil  and  tracts  of  blood  be- 
tween —  would  that  which  was  meant  as  an  inspi- 
ration for  their  souls  become  fixed  for  their  sight, 
and  tabernacles  that  should  never  perish  enclose  a 
glory  that  should  never  pass  away. 

You  may  have  anticipated  the  lessons  for  our- 
selves which  I  propose  to  draw  from  this  uncon- 


I 


14  THE   THREE   TABERNACLES. 

sidered  request  of  Peter.  At  least,  you  will 
readily  perceive  that  it  does  contain  suggestions 
applicable  to  our  daily  life.  For  I  proceed,  at 
once,  to  ask  you  if  it  is  not  a  fact  that  often  we 
would  like  to  remain  where,  and  to  have  what, 
is  not  best  for  us  ?  Do  not  illustrations  of  this 
simple  thought  occur  easily  to  your  minds  ?  Docs 
not  man  often  desire,  as  it  were,  to  build  his  tab- 
ernacles here  or  there,  when  due  consideration, 
and  after-experience  will  convince  him  that  it  was 
not  the  place  to  abide ;  that  it  was  better  that  tlie 
good  he  craved,  or  the  class  of  relations  to  whicii 
he  clung,  should  not  be  permanent  ?  In  order  to 
give  effect  to  this  train  of  reflection,  let  me  direct 
you  to  some  specific  instances  in  which  this  desire 
is  manifested. 

Perhaps  I  may  say,  without  any  over-refine- 
ment upon  my  topic,  that  there  are  three  things 
in  life  to  which  the  desires  of  men  especially  cling, 
—  three  tabernacles  which  upon  the  slope  of  this 
world  they  would  like  to  build.     I  speak  now,  it 


THE   THREE    TABERNACLES.  15 

is  to  be  remembered,  of  desires  of  impulse,  not  of 
deliberation,  —  of  desires  often  felt,  if  not  ex- 
pressed. And  I  say,  in  the  first  place,  that  there 
are  certain  conditio?is  in  life  itself  that  it  some- 
times appears  desirable  to  retain.  Sometimes, 
from  the  heart  of  a  man,  there  breaks  forth  a  sigh 
for  perpetual  youth.  In  the  perplexities  of  ma- 
ture years,  —  in  the  experience  of  selfishness,  and 
hollownesSj  and  bitter  disappointment ;  in  the  sur- 
feit of  pleasure;  in  utter  weariness  of  the  world, — 
he  exclaims,  ."  0  !  give  me  back  that  sweet  morn- 
ing of  my  days,  when  all  my  feelings  were  fresh, 
and  the  heart  was  wet  with  a  perpetual  dew. 
Give  me  the  untried  strength;  the  undeceived 
trust;  the  credulous  imagination,  that  bathed  all 
things  in  molten  glory,  and  filled  the  unknown 
world  with  infinite  possibilities."  Sad  with  scep- 
ticism, and  tired  with  speculation,  he  cries  out  for 
that  faith  that  needed  no  other  confirmation  than 
the  tones  of  a  mother's  voice,  and  found  God 
everywhere  in  the  soft  pressure  of  her  love ;  and 


16  THE    THREE    TABERNACLES. 

when  his  steps  begin  to  hesitate,  and  he  finds 
himself  among  the  long  shadows,  and  the  frailty 
and  fear  of  the  bodj  overcome  the  prophecies  of 
the  soul,  and  no  religious  assurance  lights  and 
lifts  up  his  mind,  how  he  wishes  for  some  fountain 
of  restoration  that  shall  bring  back  his  bloom  and 
his  strengh,  and  make  him  always  young!  "  Why 
have  such  experiences  as  decline,  and  decay,  and 
death?"  he  asks.  "Is  it  not  good  for  us  to  be 
ever  young  ?  Why  should  not  the  body  be  a  tab- 
ernacle of  constant  youth,  and  life  be  always  thus 
fresh,  and  buoyant,  and  innocent,  and  confiding? 
Or,  if  we  must,  at  last,  die,  why  all  this  sad 
experience,  —  this  incoming  of  weakness,  —  this 
slipping  away  of  life  and  powef  ?" 

But  this  is  a  feeling  which  no  wise  or  good 
man  ever  cherishes  long.  For  he  knows  that  the 
richest  experiences,  and  the  best  achievements  of 
life,  come  after  the  period  of  youth ;  spring  out 
of  this  very  sadness,  and  sufiering,  and  rough 
struggle  in  the  world,  which  an  unthinking  senti- 


THE   THREE    TABERNACLES.  17 

mentality  deplores.  Ah,  my  friends,  in  spite  of 
our  trials,  our  weariness,  our  sad  knowledge  of 
men  and  things;  in  spite  of  the  declining  years 
among  which  so  many  of  us  are  standing,  and 
the  tokens  of  decay  that  are  coming  upon  us; 
nay,  in  spite  even  of  our  very  sins ;  who  would  go 
back  to  the  hours  of  his  youthful  experience, 
and  have  the  shadow  stand  still  at  that  point -upon 
the  dial  of  his  life?  Who,  for  the  sake  of  its 
innocence  and  its  freshness,  would  empty  the 
treasury  of  his  broader  knowledge,  and  surrender 
the  strength  that  he  has  gathered  in  effort  and 
endurance?  Who,  for  its  careless  joy,  would 
exchange  the  heart-warm  friendships  that  have 
been  annealed  in  the  vicissitudes  of  years,  —  the 
love  that  sheds  a  richer  light  upon  our  path,  as 
its  vista  lengthens,  or  has  drawn  our  thoughts 
into  the  glory  that  is  beyond  the  vail?  Nay, 
even  if  his  being  has  been  most  frivolous  and 
aimless,  or  vile,  —  in  the  penitent  throb  with 
which  this  is  felt  to  be  so,  there  is  a  spring  of 
2 


18  THE   THREE    TABERNACLES. 

active  power  which  exists  not  in  the  dreams  of 
the  youth ;  and  the  sense  of  guilt  and  of  misery 
is  the  stirring  of  a  life  infinitely  deeper  than  that 
early  flow  of  vitality  and  consciousness  which 
sparkles  as  it  runs.  Build  a  tabernacle  for  per- 
petual youth,  and  say  "It  is  good  to  be  here " ? 
It  cannot  be  so;  and  it  is  well  that  it  cannot. 
Our  post  is  not  the  Mount  of  Vision,  but  the 
Field  of  Labor ;  and  we  can  find  no  rest  in  Edeu 
until  we  have  passed  through  Gethsemane. 

Equally  vain  is  the  desire  for  some  condition 
in  life  which  shall  be  firee  from  care,  and  want, 
and  the  burden  of  toil.  I  suppose  most  people 
cfo,  at  times,  wish  for  such  a  lot,  and  secretly 
or  openly  repine  at  the  terms  upon  which  they 
are  compelled  to  live.  The  deepest  fancy  in  the 
heart  of  the  most  busy  men  is  repose  —  retire- 
ment —  command  of  time  and  means,  untrara- 
meled  by  any  imperative  claim.  And  yet  who  is 
there  that,  thrown  into  such  a  position,  would 
find  it  for  his  real  welfare,  and  would  be  truly 


THE    THREE   TABERNACLES.  19 

happy?  Perhaps  the  most  restless  being  in  the 
world  is  the  man  who  need  do  nothing  but  keep 
still.  The  old  soldier  fights  all  his  battles  over 
again,  and  the  retired  merchant  spreads  the  sails 
of  his  thought  upon  new  ventures,  or  comes  un- 
easily down  to  snuff  the  air  of  traffic,  and  feel 
the  jar  of  wheels.  I  suppose  there  is  nobody 
whose  condition  is  so  deplorable,  so  ghastly,  as 
his  whose  lot  many  may  be  disposed  to  envy, 
—  a  man  at  the  top  of  this  world's  ease,  — 
crammed  to  repletion  with  what  is  called  "  enjoy- 
ment;" ministered  to  by  every  luxury, — the 
entire  surface  of  his  life  so  smooth  with  complete- 
ness that  there  is  not  a  jut  to  hang  a  hope  on,  — 
80  obsequiously  gratified  in  every  specific  want 
that  he  feels  miserable  from  the  very  lack  of 
wanting.  As  in  such  a  case  there  can  be  no 
religious  hfe  —  which  never  permits  us  to  rest 
in  a  feeling  of  completeness ;  which  seldom  abides 
with  fulness  of  possession,  and  never  stops  with 
self,  but  always  inspires  to  some  great  work  of 


20  THE   THREE   TABERNACLES. 

love  and  sacrifice  —  as  in  such  a  case  there  can 
be  no  religious  life,  he  fully  realizes  the  poet's 
description  of  the  splendor  and  the  wretchedness 
of  him  who 

"     *    *    built  his  soul  a  costly  pleasure-house. 
Wherein  at  ease  for  aye  to  dwell  ;" 

and  who  said 

"     *     *    0  soul,  make  merry  and  carouse. 
Dear  soul,  for  all  is  well. 

***** 
"  Singing  and  murmuring  in  her  feastful  mirth. 
Joying  to  feel  herself  alive. 
Lord  over  nature,  lord  of  the  visible  earth. 
Lord  of  the  senses  five  ; 

"  Communing  with  herself:  •  All  these  are  mine. 
And  let  the  world  have  peace  or  wars, 
*T  is  one  to  me,'      ***** 

"*****      So  three  years 
She  throve,  but  on  the  fourth  she  fell, 
Like  Herod,  when  the  shout  was  in  his  ears. 
Struck  through  with  pangs  of  hell." 

The  truth   is,  there  is  no  one  place,  however 


THE   THREE    TABERNACLES.  21 

we  may  envy  it,  which  would  be  indisputably 
good  for  us  to  occupy ;  much  less  for  us  to  remain 
in.  The  zest  of  life,  like  the  pleasure  which  we 
receive  from  a  work  of  art,  or  from  nature,  comes 
from  undulations  —  from  inequalities;  not  from 
any  monotony,  even  though  it  be  the  monotony 
of  seeming  perfection.  The  beauty  of  the  land- 
scape depends  upon  contrasts,  and  would  be  lost 
in  one  common  surface  of  splendor.  The  grand- 
eur of  the  waves  is  in  the  deep  hollows,  as  well 
as  the  culminating  crests;  and  the  bars  of  the 
sunset  glow  on  the  back-ground  of  the  twilight. 
The  very  condition  of  a  great  thing  is  that  it 
must  be  comparatively  a  rare  thing.  We  speak 
of  summer  glories,  and  yet  who  would  wish  it  to 
be  always  summer?  —  who  does  not  see  how 
admirably  the  varied  seasons  are  fitted  to  our 
appetite  for  change  ?  It  may  seem  as  if  it  would 
be  pleasant  to  have  it  always  sunshine;  and  yet 
when  fruit  and  plant  are  dying  from  lack  of 
moisture,  and  the  earth  sleeps  exhausted  in  the 


22  THE   THREE   TABERNACLES. 

torrid  air,  who  ever  saw  a  summer  morning  more 
beautiful  than  that  when  the  clouds  muster  their 
legions  to  the  sound  of  the  thunder,  and  pour 
upon  us  the  blessing  of  the  rain  ?  "We  repine  at 
toil,  and  yet  how  gladly  do  we  turn  in  from  the 
lapse  of  recreation  to  the  harness  of  effort !  We 
sigh  for  the  freedom  and  glory  of  the  country; 
but,  in  due  time,  just  as  fresh  and  beautiful  seem 
to  us  the  brick  walls  and  the  busy  streets  where 
our  lot  is  cast,  and  our  interests  run.  There  is 
no  condition  in  life  of  which  we  can  say  exclu- 
sively "It  is  good  for  us  to  be  here."  Our 
course  is  appointed  through  vicissitude,  —  our 
discipline  is  in  alternations;  and  we  can  build 
no  abiding  tabernacles  along  the  way. 

But,  I  observe,  in  the  second  place,  that  there 
are  those  who  may  discard  the  notion  of  retaining 
any  particular  condition  of  life,  and  yet  they 
would  preserve  unbroken  some  of  its  relations. 
They  may  not  keep  the  freshness  of  youth,  or 
prevent  the  intrusion  of  trouble,  or  shut  out  the 


THE    THREE   TABERNACLES.  23 

claims  of  responsibility,  or  the  demands  for  eflfcrt : 
—  they  may  not  achieve  anything  of  this  kind; 
and  they  do  not  wish  to  achieve  it;  but  they 
would  build  a  tabernacle  to  love,  and  keep  the 
objects  of  dear  affection  safe  -within  its  enclosure. 
"  Joy,  sorrow,  poverty,  riches,  youth,  decay,  — 
let  these  come  as  they  must,"  say  they,  "  in  the 
flow  of  Providence ;  but  let  the  heart's  sanctuaries 
remain  unbroken,  and  let  us  in  all  this  change 
find  the  presence  and  the  ministration  of  those 
we  love."  And,  common  as  the  sight  is,  we 
must  always  contemplate  with  a  fresh  sadness 
this  sundering  of  family  bonds ;  this  cancelling 
of  the  dear  realities  of  home ;  this  stealing  in 
of  the  inevitable  gloom;  this  vacating  of  the 
chair,  the  table,  and  the  bed ;  this  vanishing  of 
the  familiar  face  into  darkness ;  this  passage  from 
communion  to  memory ;  this  diminishing  of  love's 
orb  into  narrower  phases,  —  into  a  crescent,  — 
into  a  shadow.  Surely,  however  broad  the  view 
we  take  of  the  universe,  a  real  woe,  a  veritable 


24  THE   THREE   TABERNACLES. 

experience  of  suffering  amidst  this  boundless  be- 
nificence,  reaching  as  deep  as  the  heart's  core,  — 
is  this  old  and  common  sorrow :  —  the  sorrow  of 
woman  for  her  babes,  and  of  man  for  his  help- 
mate, and  of  age  for  its  prop,  and  of  the  son  for 
the  mother  that  bore  him,  and  of  the  heart  for 
the  hearts  that  once  beat  in  sympathy,  and  of 
the  eyes  that  hide  vacancies  witli  tears.  When 
these  old  stakes  are  wrenched  from  their  sockets, 
and  these  intimate  cords  are  snapped,  one  begins 
to  feel  his  own  tent  shake  and  flap  in  the  wind 
ihat  comes  from  eternity,  and  to  realize  that 
there  is  no  abiding  tabernacle  here. 

But  ought  we  really  to  wish  that  these  rela- 
tions might  remain  unbroken,  and  to  murmur 
because  it  is  not  so  ?  We  shall  be  able  to  answer 
this  question  in  the  negative,  I  think,  —  however 
hard  it  may  be  to  do  so,  —  when  we  consider,  in 
the  first  place,  that  this  breaking  up  and  separa- 
tion are  inevitable.  For  we  may  be  assured  that 
whatever  in  the  system  of  things  is  inevitable  is 


THE   THREE   TABERNACLES.  25 

beneficent.  The  dissolution  of  these  bonds  comes 
bj  the  same  law  as  that  which  ordains  them ;  and 
we  may  be  sure  that  the  one  —  though  it  plays 
out  of  sight,  and  is  swallowed  up  in  mystery  — 
is  as  wise  and  tender  in  its  purpose  as  the  other. 
It  is  very  consoling  to  recognize  the  Hand  that 
gave  in  the  Hand  that  takes  a  friend,  and  to 
know  that  he  is  borne  away  in  the  bosom  of 
Infinite  Gentleness,  as  he  was  brought  here.  It 
is  the  privilege  of  angels,  and  of  a  faith  that 
brings  us  near  the  angels,  to  always  behold  the 
face  of  our  Father  in  Heaven ;  and  so  we  shall 
not  desire  the  abrogation  of  this  law  of  dissolution 
and  separation.  We  shall  strengthen  ourselves 
to  contemplate  the  fact  that  the  countenances 
we  love  must  change,  and  the  ties  that  are  closest 
to  our  hearts  will  break ;  and  we  shall  feel  that 
it  ought  to  be,  because  it  must  be,  —  because  it 
is  an  inevitability  in  that  grand  and  bounteous 
scheme  in  which  stars  rise  and  set,  and  life  and 
death  play  into  each  other. 


26  THE   THREE   TABERNACLES. 

But,  even  within  the  circle  of  our  own  knowl- 
edge, there  is  that  which  may  reconcile  us  to 
these  separations,  and  prevent  the  vain  wish  of 
building  perpetual  tabernacles  for  our  human  love. 
For  who  is  prepared,  at  any  time,  to  say  that  it 
was  not  better  for  the  dear  friend,  and  better  for 
ourselves,  that  he  should  go,  rather  than  stay ;  * — 
better  for  the  infant  to  die  with  flowers  upon  its 
breast,  than  to  live  and  have  thorns  in  its  heart ; 
—  better  to  kiss  the  innocent  lips  that  are  still 
and  cold,  than  to  see  the  living  lips  that  are 
scorched  with  guilty  passion ;  —  better  to  take 
our  last  look  of  a  face  while  it  is  pleasant  to 
remember  —  serene  with  thought,  and  faith,  and 
many  charities  —  than  to  see  it  toss  in  prolonged 
agony,  and  grow  hideous  with  the  wreck  of  intel- 
lect ?  And,  as  spiritual  beings,  —  placed  here  not 
to  be  gratified,  but  to  be  trained,  —  surely  we 
know  that  often  it  is  the  drawing  up  of  these 
earthly  ties  that  draws  up  our  souls ;  that  a  great 
bereavement  breaks  the  crust  of  our  mere  animal 


THE   THREE   TABERNACLES.  27 

consciousness,  and  inaugurates  a  spiritual  faith; 
and  we  are  baptized  into  eternal  life  through  the 
cloud  and  the  shadow  of  death. 

But,  once  more,  I  remark,  that  there  are 
those  who  may  say,  "We  do  not  ask  for  any 
permanence  in  the  conditions  of  life;  we  do  not 
ask  that  even  its  dearest  relationships  should  be 
retained ;  but  give,  0  !  give  us  ever  those  highest, 
brightest  moods  of  faith  and  of  truth,  which 
constitute  the  glory  of  religion,  and  lift  us  above 
the  conflict  and  the  sin  of  the  world ! "  No  truly 
religious  mind  can  fail  to  perceive  the  gravitation 
of  its  thoughts  and  desires,  and  the  contrast  be- 
tween its  usual  level  and  its  best  moments  of 
contemplation  and  prayer.  And  it  may  indeed  ' 
seem  well  to  desire  the  prolongation  of  these 
experiences;  to  desire  to  live  ever  in  that  un- 
worldly radiance,  close  to  the  canopy  of  God,  — 
in  company  with  the  great  and  the  holy,  —  in 
company  with  the  apostles  and  with  Jesus,  — 
on  some   Mount  of  Transfiguration,  in  garments 


28  THE   THREE   TABERNACLES. 

whiter  than  snow,  and  with  faces  bright  as  the 
sun;  and  the  hard,  bad,  trying  world  far  distant 
and  far  below.  Does  not  the  man  of  spiritual 
sensitiveness  envy  those  sainted  ones  who  have 
grown  apart,  in  pure  clusters,  away  above  the 
sinful  world,  blossoming  and  breathing  fragrance 
on  the  very  slopes  of  heaven  ? 
.  And  yet,  is  this  the  complete  ideal  of  life? 
and  is  this  the  way  in  which  we  are  to  accom- 
plish its  true  end?  I  think  we  may  safely  say 
that  even  the  brightest  realizations  of  religion 
should  be  comparatively  rare,  otherwise  we .  forget 
the  work  and  lose  the  discipline  of  our  mortal  lot. 
The  great  saints  —  the  men  whose  names  stand 
highest  in  the  calendar  of  the  church  universal  — 
are  not  the  ascetics,  not  the  contemplators,  not 
the  men  who  walked  apart  in  cloisters ;  but  those 
who  came  down  from  the  Mount  of  Communion 
and  Glory,  to  take  a  part  in  the  world ;  who  have 
carried  its  bui'dens  in  their  souls,  and  its  scars 
upon  their  breasts;   who  have  wrought  for  its 


THE   THREE   TABERNACLES.  29 

deepest  interests,  and  died  for  its  highest  good; 
whose  garments  have  swept  its  common  wa.ys,  and 
whose  voices  have  thrilled  in  its  low  places  of 
suffering  and  of  need ;  —  men  who  have  leaned 
lovingly  against  the  world,  until  the  motion  of 
their  great  hearts  jars  in  its  pulses  forever ;  men 
who  have  gone  up  from  dust,  and  blood,  and 
crackling  fire ;  men  with  faces  of  serene  endurance 
and  lofty  denial,  yet  of  broad,  genial,  human 
sympathies ;  —  these  are  the  men  who  wear  starry 
crowns,  and  walk  in  white  robes,  yonder. 

We  need  our  visions  for  inspiration,  but  we 
must  work  in  comparative  shadow ;  otherwise,  the 
very  highest  revelations  would  become  monoto- 
nous, and  we  should  long  for  still  higher.  And 
yet,  are  there  not  some  whose  desire  is  for  con- 
stant revelation?  Who  would  see  supernatural 
sights,  and  hear  supernatural  sounds,  and  know 
all  the  realities  towards  which  they  are  drifting, 
as  well  as  those  in  which  they  must  work  ?  They 
would   make   this   world   a   mount  of  perpetual 


30  THE    THREE   TABERNACLES. 

vision;  overlooking  the  feet  that  it  has  its  own 
purposes,  to  be  wrought  out  bj  its  own  light,  and 
within  its  own  limits.  For  my  part,  I  must 
confess  that  I  do  not  share  in  this  desire  to  know 
all  about  the  next  world,  and  to  see  beforehand 
everything  that  is  going  to  be.  I  have  no  solici- 
tnde  about  the  mere  scenery  and  modes  of  the 
ftiture  state.  But  this  desire  to  be  in  the  midst 
of  perpetual  revelations  argues  that  there  is  not 
enough  to  fill  our  minds  and  excite  our  wonder 
here;  when  all  things  around  us  are  pregnant 
with  suggestion,  and  invite  us,  and  offer  unfath- 
omed  depths  for  our  curious  seeking.  There  is 
80  much  here,  too,  for  our  love  and  our  discipline ; 
so  much  for  us  to  ci!o,  that  we  hardly  need  more 
revelations  just  now ;  —  they  might  overwhelm 
and  disturb  us  in  the  pursuit  of  these  appointed 
ends.  Moreover,  the  gratification  of  this  desire 
would  foreclose  that  glorious  anticipation,  that 
trembling  expectancy,  which  is  so  fraught  with 
inspiration  and  delight,  —  the  joy  of  the  unknown, 


THE    THREE   TABERNACLES.  31 

—  the  bliss  of  the  thought  that  there  is  a  great 
deal  yet  to  be  revealed. 

We  do  need  some  revelation ;  just  such  as  has 
been  given ;  —  a  glimpse  of  the  immortal  splen- 
dors; an  articulate  Voice  from  heaven  —  a  view 
of  the  glorified  Jesus ;  a  revelation  in  a  point  of 
time,  just  as  that  on  the  mount  was  in  point  of 
space.  We  need  some ;  but  not  too  much,  — 
not  aU  revelation ;  not  revelation  as  a  customary 
fact.  If  so,  I  repeat,  we  should  neglect  this 
ordained  field  of  thought  and  action.  We  should 
live  in  a  sphere  of  supernaturalism,  —  in  an  at- 
mosphere  of  wonder,  —  amid  a  planetary  roll  of 
miracles ;  still  unsatisfied ;  still  needing  the  sug- 
gestion of  higher  points  to  break  the  stupendous 
monotony. 

And  I  insist  that  work,  not  visiofi,  is  to  be 
the  ordinary  method  of  our  being  here,  against 
the  position  of  those  who  shut  themselves  in  to  a 
contemplative  and  extatic  piety.  They  would 
escape  from  the  age,  and  its  anxieties ;  they  would 


32  THE   THREE   TABERNACLES. 

recall  past  conditions;  they  would  get  into  the 
shadow  of  cloisters,  and  build  cathedrals  for  an 
exclusive  sanctity.  And,  indeed,  we  would  do 
well  to  consider  those  tendencies  of  our  time 
which  lead  us  away  from  the  inner  life  of  faith 
and  prayer.  But  this  we  should  cherish,  not 
by  withdrawing  all  sanctity  from  life,  but  by 
pouring  sanctity  into  life.  We  should  not  quit 
the  world,  to  build  tabernacles  in  the  Mount  of 
Transfiguration,  but  come  from  out  the  celestial 
brightness,  to  shed  light  into  the  world,  —  to 
make  the  whole  earth  a  cathedral;  to  overarch 
it  with  Christian  ideals,  to  transfigure  its  gross 
and  guilty  features,  and  fill  it  with  redeeming 
truth  and  love. 

Surely,  the  lesson  of  the  incident  connected 
with  the  text  is  clear,  so  far  as  the  apostles  were 
concerned,  who  beheld  that  dazzling  brightness, 
and  that  heavenly  companionship,  apart  on  the 
mount.  They  were  not  permitted  to  remain 
apart:    but   were    dismissed    to    their   appointed 


THE   THREE   TABERNACLES.  33 

work.  Peter  went  to  denial  and  repentance,  — 
to  toil  and  martyrdom ;  James  to  utter  his  pi*ac- 
tical  truth ;  John  to  send  the  fervor  of  his  spirit 
among  the  splendors  of  the  Apocalypse,  and,  in 
its  calmer  flow  through  his  Gospel,  to  give  us 
the  clearest  mirror  of  the  Saviour's  face. 

Nay,  even  for  the  Redeemer  that  was  not  to 
be  an  abiding  vision ;  and  he  illustrates  the  pur- 
port of  life  as  he  descends  from  his  transfiguration 
to  toil,  and  goes  forward  to  exchange  that  robe 
of  heavenly  brightness  for  the  crown  of  thorns. 

What  if  Jesus  had  remained  there,  upon  that 
Mount  of  Vision,  and  himself  stood  before  us  as 
only  a  transfigured  form  of  glory?  Where  then 
would  be  the  peculiarity  of  hia  work,  and  its 
eflfect  upon  the  world  ? 

On  the  wall  of  the  Vatican,  untarnished  by 
the  passage  of  three  hundred  years,  hangs  the 
master-piece  of  Raphael,  —  his  picture  of  the 
Transfiguration.  In  the  centre,  with  the  glisten- 
ing raiment  and  the  altered  countenance,  stands 


34  THE  THREE   TABERNACLES. 

the  Redeemer,  On  the  right  hand  and  on  the 
left  are  his  glorified  visitants;  while,  underneath 
the  bright  cloud,  lie  the  forms  of  Peter,  and 
James,  and  John,  gazing  at  the  transfigured 
Jesus,  shading  their  faces  as  thej  look.  Some- 
thing of  the  rapture  and  the  awe  that  attracted 
the  apostles  to  that  shining  spot  seems  to  have 
seized  the  soul  of  the  great  artist,  and  filled  him 
with  his  greatest  inspiration.  But  he  saw  what 
the  apostles,  at  that  moment,  did  not  see,  and, 
in  another  portion  of  his  picture,  has  represented 
the  scene  at  the  foot  of  the  hill,  —  the  group 
that  awaited  the  descent  of  Jesus.  The  poor  pos- 
sessed boy,  writhing,  and  foaming,  and  gnashing 
his  teeth,  —  his  eyes,  as  some  say,  in  their  wild, 
rolling  agony,  already  catching  a  glimpse  of  the 
glorified  Christ  above;  the  baffled  disciples,  the 
cavilling  scribes,  the  impotent  physicians,  the  grief- 
worn  feither,  seeking  in  vain  for  help.  Suppose 
Jesus  had  stayed  upon  the  mount,  what  would 
have  become  of  that  group  of  want,  and  helpless- 


THE   THREE   TABERNACLES.  35 

ness,  and  agony?  Suppose  Christ  had  remained 
in  the  brightness  of  that  vision  forever,  —  himself 
only  a  vision  of  glory,  and  not  an  example  of  toil, 
and  sorrow,  and  suffering,  and  death,  —  alas !  for 
the  great  world  at  large,  waiting  at  the  foot  of 
the  hill ;  —  the  groups  of  humanity  in  all  ages ;  — 
the  sin-possessed  sufferers ;  the  cavilling  sceptics ; 
the  philosophei*s,  with  their  books  and  instru- 
ments ;  the  bereaved  and  frantic  mourners  in  their 
need! 

So,  my  hearers,  wrapped  in  the  higher  moods 
of  the  soul,  and  wishing  to  abide  among  upper 
glories,  we  may  not  see  the  work  that  waits  for  us 
along  our  daily  path ;  without  doing  which  all 
our  visions  are  vain.  We  must  have  the  visions. 
We  need  them  in  our  estimate  of  the  world  around 
us,  —  of  the  aspects  and  destinies  of  humanity. 
There  are  times  when  justice  is  balked,  and  truth 
covered  up,  and  freedom  trampled  down ;  —  when 
we  may  well  be  tempted  to  ask,  "  What  is  the  use 
of  trying  to  work  ?  "  —  when  we  may  well  inquire 


86  THE    THREE    TABERNACLES. 

whether  what  we  are  doing  is  work  at  all.  And 
in  such  a  case,  or  in  any  other,  one  is  lifted  up, 
and  inspired,  and  enabled  to  do  and  to  endure  all 
things,  when  in  steady  vision  he  beholds  the  ever- 
living  God,  —  when  all  around  the  injustice,  and 
conflict,  and  sufiering  of  the  world,  he  detects  the 
Divine  Presence,  like  a  bright  cloud  overshadow- 
ing. 0  !  then  doubt  melts  away,  and  wrong 
dwindles,  and  the  jubilee  of  victorious  falsehood 
is  but  a  peal  of  drunken  laughter,  and  the  spit- 
tings of  guilt  and  contempt  no  more  than  flakes 
of  foam  flung  against  a  hero's  breast-plate.  Then 
one  sees,  as  it  were,  with  the  vision  of  God,  who 
looked  down  upon  the  old  cycles,  when  a  swelter- 
ing waste  covered  the  face  of  the  globe,  and  huge, 
reptile  natures  held  it  in  dominion  ;  —  who  be- 
holds the  pulpy  worm,  down  in  the  sea,  building 
the  pillars  of  continents ;  —  so  one  sees  the  princi- 
palities of  evil  sliding  from  their  thrones,  and  the 
deposits  of  humble  faithfulness  rising  from  the 
deep   of   ages.      Our   sympathy,    our   benevolent 


THE   THREE   TABERNACLES.  3/ 

effort  in  the  work  of  God  and  humanity,  how 
much  do  they  need  not  only  the  vision  of  intel- 
lectual foresight,  but  of  the  faith  which,  on 
bended  knees,  sees  further  than  the  telescope  ! 

And  alas !  for  him  who,  in  his  personal  need 
and  effort,  has  no  margin  of  holier  inspiration  — 
no  rim  of  divine  splendor  —  around  his  daily  life  ! 
Without  the  vision  of  life's  great  realities  we 
cannot  see  what  our  work  is,  or  know  how  to 
do  it. 

But  such  visions  must  be  necessarily  rare  and 
transient,  or  we  shall  miss  their  genuine  efficacy. 
We  must  work  in  comparative  shadow,  without 
the  immediate  sight  of  these  realities;  and  only 
in  the  place  of  our  rest,  —  rest  for  higher  efforts 
and  a  new  career,  —  only  there  may  we  have  their 
constant  companionship,  and  build  their  perpetual 
tabernacles. 


^\t  $|aboto  flf  gisapintment. 


Bat  we  trasted  that  it  had   been  he  which  should   have  redeemed 
larael.     Luke  xxiv.  21. 


G^N  the  accounts  of  the  disciples,  contained  in 
^M  the  New  Testament,  there  is  no  attempt  to 
glorify  them,  or  to  conceal  any  weakness.  From 
the  first  to  the  last,  they  think  and  act  precisely 
as  men  would  think  and  act  in  their  circum- 
stances ;  —  they  are  affected  just  as  others  of  like 
culture  would  be  affected  by  such  events  as  those 
set  forth  in  the  record.  And  the  genuineness 
of  their  conduct  argues  the  genuineness  of  the  in- 
cidents which  excited  it.  The  divine,  wonder- 
working, risen  Jesus,  is  the  necessary  counterpart 
of  the  amazed,  believing,  erring  hoping,  despond- 


42        THE    SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOINTMENT. 

ing,  rejoicing  fishermen  and  publicans.  This 
stamp  of  reality  is  very  evident  in  the  instance 
before  us.  The  conduct  and  the  feelings  of  the 
disciples  are  those  of  men  who  have  been  involved 
in  a  succession  of  strange  experiences.  For  & 
little  while  they  have  been  in  communion  with 
One  who  has  spoken  as  never  man  spoke,  ard 
who  has  touched  the  deepest  springs  of  their 
being.  He  has  lifted  them  out  of  the  narrow 
limits  of  their  previous  lives.  From  the  Receipt 
of  Customs,  and  the  Galilean  lake,  he  has  sum- 
moned them  to  the  interests  and  awards,  the 
thought  and  the  work,  of  a  spiritual  and  divine 
kingdom.  At  first  following  him,  perhaps  they 
hardly  knew  why,  conscious  only  that  he  had 
the  Words  of  Eternal  Life,  the  terms  of  this  dis- 
cipleship  have  grown  into  bonds  of  the  dearest 
intimacy.  Their  Master  haa  become  their  Com- 
panion and  their  Friend,  and  their  faith  has 
deepened  into  tender  and  confiding  love.  But 
still,  theirs  has   been  the  belief  of  the  trusting 


THE    SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOINTMENT.        43 

soul,  rather  than  the  enlightened  intellect.  From 
the  fitness  of  the  teaching,  and  the  wonder  of 
the  miracle,  they  have  felt  that  he  was  the  very 
Christ ;  and  yet,  from  this  conviction  of  the  heart 
they  have  not  been  able  to  separate  their  Jewish 
conceits.  Sometimes,  it  may  be,  the  language  of 
the  Saviour  has  carried  them  up  into  a  broader 
and  more  spiritual  region ;  but  then,  they  have 
subsided  into  their  symbols  and  shadows ;  —  only, 
notwithstanding  the  errors  that  have  hindered, 
and  the  hints  that  have  awed  them,  they  have 
steadily  felt  the  inspiration  of  a  great  hope,  — 
the  expectation  of  something  glorious  to  be  re- 
vealed in  the  speedy  coming  of  the  Messiah's 
kingdom.  And  now,  does  not  the  account  im- 
mediately connected  with  the  text  picture  for  us 
exactly  the  state  of  men  whose  conceptions  have 
been  broken  up  by  a  great  shock,  and  yet  in 
whose  hearts  the  central  hope  still  remains  and 
vibrates  with  mysterious  tenacity  ?  —  men  who 
have  had  the  form  of  their  expectation  utterly 


44        THE    SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOINTMENT. 

refuted  and  scattered  into  darkness,  but  who  still 
cherish  its  spirit  ?  Christ  the  crowned  King,  — 
Christ  the  armed  Deliverer,  —  Christ  the  Avenger, 
sweeping  away  his  foes  with  one  burst  of  miracle, 
—  is,  to  them,  no  more.  They  saw  the  multitude 
seize  him,  and  no  legions  came  to  rescue  ;  —  they 
saw  him  led  unresistingly  away ;  —  they  saw  him 
condemned,  abused,  crucified,  buried;  and  so,  in 
no  sense  of  which  they  could  conceive,  was  this 
he  who  should  have  redeemed  Israel.  And  yet 
the  suggestion  of  something  still  to  come,  —  some- 
thing connected  with  three  days,  —  lingered  in 
their  minds.  And,  in  the  midst  of  their  despon- 
dency, striking  upon  this  very  chord,  the  startling 
rumor  reached  them  that  Christ  had  risen  from 
the  dead.  It  was  in  this  mood  that  Jesus  found 
the  two  disciples  whose  words  I  have  selected  for 
my  text;  —  faith  and  doubt,  disappointment  and 
hope,  alternating  in  their  minds;  their  Jewish  con- 
ceit laid  prostrate  in  the  dust,  and  yet  the  expec- 
tation of  something,  they   knew   not   what,  now 


THE    SHADOW    OF   DISAPPOINTMENT.       45 

strangely  confirmed.  See  how  these  feelings  min- 
gle in  the  passage  before  us.  "  What  manner  of 
communications,"  said  the  undiscemed  Saviour, 
"are  these  that  ye  have  one  to  another,  as  ye 
walk,  and  are  sad?"  —  "Art  thou  only  a  stranger 
in  Jerusalem,"  says  one  of  them,  "and  hast  not 
known  the  things  which  are  come  to  pass  there  in 
these  days?"  What  things?  "Concerning  Je- 
sus of  Nazareth,"  replied  they,  "which  was  a 
prophet  mighty  in  deed  and  word  before  God  and 
all  the  people :  and  how  the  chief  priests  and  our 
rulers  delivered  him  to  be  condemned  to  death, 
and  have  crucified  him.  But  we  trusted  that  it 
had  been  he  which  should  have  redeemed  Israel : 
and  beside  all  this,  to-day  is  the  third  day  since 
these  things  were  done.  Yea,  and  certain  women 
also  of  our  company  made  us  astonished,  which 
were  early  at  the  sepulchre ;  and  when  they  found 
not  his  body,  they  came,  saying,  that  they  had 
also  seen  a  vision  of  angels,  which  said  that  he  was 
alive.     And  certain  of  them  which  were  with  us 


46        THE   SHADOW    OF   DISAPPOINTMENT. 

went  to  the  sepulchre,  and  found  it  even  so  as  the 
women  had  said :  but  him  thej  saw  not." 

My  hearers,  I  think  we  see,  in  this  instance, 
the  minds  of  these  disciples  working  as  the  minds 
of  men  might  be  expected  to  work  under  like  con- 
ditions. And  to  me  this  casts  a  complexion  of 
genuineness  upon  the  transactions  which,  as  stated 
in  the  record,  account  for  these  mental  alterna- 
tions. The  entire  passage  is  alive  with  reality. 
The  genuine  emotions  of  humanity  play  and  thrill 
together  there,  in  the  shadow  of  the  cross  and  the 
glory  of  the  resurrection. 

But,  if  these  feelings  are  thus  natural,  the 
experience  itself  indicated  in  that  portion  of  this 
verse  which  constitutes  the  text  is  not  entirely 
removed  from  our  ordinary  life.  The  incident 
which  occasioned  these  sad  words  was  an  extraor- 
dinary one ;  but  its  moral  significance,  as  it  now 
comes  before  us,  illustrates  many  a  passage  in 
man's  daily  course.  The  language,  as  we  read 
it,  appears  to  be  the  language  of  disappointment ; 


THE    SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOINTMENT.        47 

—  it  Avas  under  the  shadow  of  diappointment, 
though  alternating  with  hope,  that  these  disciples 
spoke ;  and  it  is  to  the  lessons  aflForded  by  disap- 
pointment in  the  course  of  life  that  I  now  es- 
pecially invite  your  attention. 

And  the  precise  point  in  the  text,  bearing  upon 
this  subject,  is  the  fact,  that  while  the  disciples 
seemed  to  feel  as  though  all  redemption  for  Israel 
was  now  hopeless,  that  process  of  redemption  for 
Israel,  and  for  the  world,  was  going  on  through 
the  agency  of  those  very  events  which  had  filled 
them  with  dismay.  Even  as  they  were  speaking, 
in  tones  of  sadness,  about  the  crucified  Christ,  the 
living  Christ,  made  perfect  for  his  work  by  that 
crucifixion,  was  walking  by  their  side.  Looking 
far  this  side  of  that  shadow  of  disappointment 
which  then  brooded  over  them,  we  see  all  this, 
that  then  they  did  not  see ;  but  how  is  it  with 
ourselves,  under  the  frequent  shadows  cast  by 
more  ordinary  events  ?  This  suggestion  may  af- 
ford us  some  profitable  thoughts. 


48       THE   SHADOW   OF   DISAPPOINTMENT. 

I  need  hardly  say,  in  the  first  place,  that  man 
is  continually  inspired  by  expectation.  Every 
eflFort  he  makes  is  made  in  the  conviction  of  possi- 
bility and  the  light  of  hope.  This  is  the  heart  of 
ambition  and  the  spring  of  toil.  It  is  the  balm 
which  he  applies  to  the  wounds  of  misfortune.  It 
is  the  key  with  which  he  tries  the  wards  of  nature. 
And  from  the  morning  of  life  to  its  last  twilight 
he  is  always  looking  forward.  The  saddest  spec- 
tacle of  all  —  sadder  even  than  pain,  and  bereave- 
ment, and  death  —  is  a  man  void  of  hope.  The 
most  abject  people  is  a  hopeless  people,  in  whoso 
hearts  the  memories  of  the  past,  and  the  pulses  of 
endeavor,  and  the  courage  of  faith  are  dead,  and 
who  crouch  by  their  own  thresholds  and  the 
crumbling  tomb-stones  of  their  fathers,  and  take 
the  tyrant's  will,  without  an  incentive,  and  with- 
out even  a  dream.  The  most  intense  form  iu 
which  misery  can  express  itself  is  in  the  phrase, 
"  I  have  nothing  to  live  for."  And  he  who  can 
actually  say,  and  who  really  feels  this,  is  dead. 


THE   SHADOW    OF   DISAPPOINTMENT.       49 

and  covered  with  the  very  pall  and  darkness  of 
calamity.  But  few,  indeed,  are  they  who  can, 
with  truth,  say  this. 

But  if  hope  or  expectation  is  such  a  vital  ele- 
ment of  human  experience,  so  does  disappoint- 
ment have  its  part  in  the  mechanism  of  things, 
and,  as  we  shall  presently  see,  its  wise  and  bene- 
ficial part.  For,  after  all,  how  few  things  cor- 
respond with  the  forecast  of  expectation !  To  be 
sure,  some  results  transcend  our  hope;  but  how 
many  fall  below  it,  —  balk  it,  —  turn  out  exactly 
opposite  to  it !  Among  those  who  meet  with  dis- 
appointments in  life,  there  are  those  who  are 
expecting  impossibilities,  —  whose  expectations  are 
inordinate,  —  are  more  thau  the  nature  of  things 
Av  ill  admit ;  or  who  are  looking  for  a  harvest  where 
they  have  planted  no  seed.  They  carry  the 
dreams  of  youth  in  among  the  realities  of  the 
world,  and  its  vanishing  visions  leave  them  naked 
and  discouraged.  The  light  of  romance,  that  glo- 
rified all  things  in  the  future,  recedes  as  they  ad- 


50        THE   SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOINTMENT. 

vance.  and  they  come  upon  rugged  paths  of  fact, 
—  upon  plain  toil  and  daily  care,  —  upon  the 
market  and  the  field,  and  upon  men  as  they  are 
in  their  weakness,  and  their  selfishness,  and  their 
mutual  distrust.  Or  they  belong,  it  may  be,  to 
that  class  who  are  too  highly  charged  with  hope ; 
whose  sanguine  notions  never  go  by  induction,  but 
by  leaps ;  who  never  calculate  the  difficulties,  but 
only  see  the  thing  complete  and  rounded  in  imagi- 
nation ;  —  men  with  plenty  of  poetry,  and  no 
arithmetic;  whose  theories  work  miracles,  but 
whose  attempts  are  failures.  It  is  pleasant,  some- 
times, to  meet  with  people  like  these,  who,  clothed 
in  the  scantiest  garments,  and  with  only  a  crust 
upon  their  tables,  at  the  least  touch  of  suggestion, 
mount  into  a  region  of  splendor.  Their  poverty 
all  fades  away ;  —  the  bare  walls,  the  tokens  of 
stern  want,  the  dusty  world,  are  all  transfigured 
with  infinite  possibilities.  Achievement  is  only  a 
word,  and  fortune  comes  in  at  a  stride.  The  pal- 
ace of  beauty  rises,  fruits  bloom  in  waste  places, 


THE    SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOINTMENT.        51 

gold  drops  from  the  rocks,  and  the  entire  move- 
ment of  hfe  becomes  a  march  of  jubilee.  And 
they  are  so  certain  this  time,  —  the  plan  they  now 
have  is  so  sure  to  succeed  !  I  repeat,  it  is  pleas- 
ant, sometimes,  to  have  intercourse  with  such 
men,  who  throw  bloom  and  marvelousness  upon 
the  actualities  of  the  world,  from  the  reservoirs  of 
their  sanguine  invention.  At  least,  it  is  pleasant 
to  think  how  this  faculty  of  unfailing  enthusiasm 
enables  them  to  bear  defeat,  and  to  look  away 
from  the  cold  face  of  necessity ;  —  to  think  that, 
while  so  many  are  trudging  after  the  sounding 
wheels  and  the  monotonous  jar  of  life,  and  lying 
down  by  the  way  to  die,  these  men  are  marching 
buoyantly  to  a  tune  inside.  And  yet  this  is  pleas- 
ant only  from  a  hasty  point  of  view.  These  peo- 
ple meet  with  disappointment,  of  course ;  and  it  is 
sad  to  think  how  many  lives  have  come  to  abso- 
lutely nothing,  and  are  all  strewn  over,  from  boy- 
hood to  the  grave,  with  the  fragments  of  splendid 
schemes.     It  is  sad  to  think  how  all  their  vision- 


52        THE    SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOINTxMENT. 

ary  Balbecs  and  Palmyras  have  been  reared  in  a 
real  desert,  —  the  desert  of  an  existence  producing 
no  substantial  thing.     And  among  these  vanishincr 

o  o  o 

dreams,  and  on  that  melancholy  waste,  they  learn, 
at  last,  the  meaning  of  their  disappointment.  And. 
from  their  experience,  we  too  may  learn,  that  we 
are  placed  here  to  be  not  merely  ideal  artists,  but 
actual  toilers ;  not  cadets  of  hope,  but  soldiers  of 
endeavor. 

But  there  are  disappointments  in  life  that  suc- 
ceed reasonable  expectation;  and  these  are  the 
hardest  of  all  to  bear.  I  say  the  expectation  is 
reasonable;  and  yet,  very  possibly,  the  bitterness 
of  the  disappointment  comes  from  neglecting  to 
consider  the  infirmity  of  all  earthly  things.  It  is 
hard  when,  not  dreaming,  but  trying  our  best,  we 
fail.  It  is  hard  to  bear  the  burden  and  heat  of 
the  day,  through  all  life's  prime,  and  yet,  with  all 
our  toil,  to  earn  no  repose  for  its  evening  hours. 
It  is  hard  to  accumulate  a  little  gain,  baptizing 
every  dollar  with  our  honest  sweat,  and  then  have 


THE    SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOINTMENT.        53 

it  stricken  from  our  grasp  by  the  hand  of  calamity 
or  of  fraud.  It  is  hard,  when  we  have  placed  our 
confidence  in  man's  honor,  or  his  friendship,  to 
find  that  we  are  fools,  and  that  we  have  been  led 
in  among  rocks  and  serpents.  And  hard  indeed  is 
it  to  see  those  who  were  worthy  our  love  and  our 
faith  drop  by  our  side,  and  leave  us  alone.  This 
dear  child,  the  blossom  of  so  many  hopes,  —  hard 
is  it  to  see  him  die ;  —  to  fold  all  our  expectation 
in  his  little  shroud,  and  lay  it  away  forever.  We 
thought  it  had  been  he  who  should  have  comforted 
and  blessed  us,  —  in  whose  life  we  could  have 
retraced  the  cycle  of  our  own  happiest  experience, 
—  whose  unfolding  faculties  would  have  been  a 
renewal  of  our  knowledge,  and  his  manhood  not 
merely  the  prop  but  the  refreshing  of  our  age. 
This  companion  of  our  lot,  —  this  wedded  wife  of 
our  heart,  —  why  taken  away  now  ?  She  has 
shared  our  early  struggles,  and  tempered  our  anx- 
iety with  cheerful  assurance.  She  has  tasted  the 
bitterness:    we  thought  she  would   have   been  a 


54        THE   SHADOW    OF   DISAPPOINTMENT. 

partner  of  the  joy.  She  has  borne  our  fretfulness, 
and  helped  our  perplexity,  and  shed  a  serene  light 
into  our  gloom ;  we  thought  she  would  have  been 
with  us  when  we  could  pay  the  debt  of  faithful- 
ness ;  when  the  cares  of  business  did  not  press  and 
disturb  us  so.  We  thought  it  was  she  whose 
voice,  sweet  with  the  music  of  old,  deep  memories, 
would  have  consoled  us  far  along;  and  that,  in 
some  calm  evening  of  life,  when  all  the  tumult  of 
the  world  was  still,  and  we  were  ready  to  go,  we 
should  go  —  not  far  apart  —  gently  to  our  graves. 

Such  are  the  plans  that  we  lay  out,  saying  of 
this  thing  and  of  that  thing,  "  We  trusted  that  it 
would  have  been  so."  But  the  answer  has  been 
—  disappointment.  The  old,  ay,  perhaps  the  most 
common  lesson  of  life,  is  disappointment. 

And  now  I  ask,  is  it  not  an  intended  lesson  ? 
Evidently  it  comes  in  as  an  element  in  the  Provi- 
dential plan  in  which  we  are  involved.  For  we 
see  its  disciplinary  nature, — its  wise  and  beneficial 
results   in   harmony   with    that   plan.      Consider 


THE   SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOINTMENT.       55 

whether  it  is  not  the  fact,  that  the  entire  discipline 
of  life  grows  out  of  a  succession  of  disappoint- 
ments. That  youthful  dream,  in  which  life  has 
stretched  out  like  a  sunny  landscape  with  purple 
mountain-chains ;  —  is  it  not  well  that  it  is  broken 
up,  and  we  strike  upon  rugged  realities?  Does 
not  all  the  strength  of  manhood,  and  the  power  of 
achievement,  and  the  glory  of  existence,  depend 
upon  these  things  which  are  not  included  in  the 
young  boy's  vision  of  a  happy  world.  Welcome, 
0  !  disappointment  of  our  hope  that  life  would 
prove  a  perpetual  holiday.  Welcome  experience 
of  the  fact  that  blessing  comes  not  from  pleasure, 
but  from  labor !  For  in  that  experience  alone 
was  there  ever  anything  truly  great  or  good  ac- 
complished. We  can  conceive  no  possible  way  by 
which  one  can  be  made  personally  strong  without 
his  own  effort; — no  possible  way  by  which  the 
mind  can  be  enriched  and  strengthened  where  it  is 
lifted  up,  instead  of  climbing  for  itself;  —  no  way, 
therefore,  in  which  life  could  be  at  all  a  worthy 


66        THE    SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOINTMENT. 

achievement,  if  it  were  merely  a  plain  of  ease, 
instead  of  holding  every  ward  of  knowledge  and  of 
power  under  the  guard  of  diflBculty  and  the  requi- 
sition of  endeavor. 

And  it  is  equally  true  that  the  greatest  suc- 
cesses grow  out  of  great  failures.  In  numerous 
instances  the  result  is  better  that  comes  after  a 
series  of  abortive  experiences  than  it  would  have 
been  if  it  had  come  at  once.  For  all  these  succes- 
sive failures  induce  a  skill,  which  is  so  much 
additional  power  working  into  the  final  achieve- 
ment. Nobody  passes  at  once  to  the  mastery,  in 
any  branch  of  science  or  of  industry ;  and  when  he 
does  become  a  master  in  his  work  it  is  evident,  not 
only  in  the  positive  excellence  of  his  performance, 
but  in  the  sureness  with  which  he  avoids  defects : 
and  these  defects  he  has  learned  by  experimental 
failures.  The  hand  that  evokes  such  perfect 
music  from  the  instrument  has  often  failed  in  its 
touch,  and  bungled  among  the  keys.  And  if  a 
man  derives  skill  from  his  own  failures,  so  does  he 


THE    SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOINTMENT.        57 

from  the  failures  of  other  men.  Every  unsuccess- 
ful attempt  is,  for  him,  so  much  work  done;  for 
he  will  not  go  over  that  ground  again,  but  seek 
some  new  way.  Every  disappointed  effort  fences 
in  and  indicates  the  only  possible  path  of  success, 
and  makes  it  easier  to  find.  We  should  thank 
past  ages  and  other  men,  not  only  for  what  they 
have  left  us  of  great  things  done,  but  for  the 
heritage  of  their  failures.  Every  baffled  effort  for 
freedom  contributes  skill  for  the  next  attempt,  and 
ensures  the  day  of  victory.  Nations  stripped  and 
bound,  and  waiting  for  liberty  under  the  shadow 
of  thrones,  cherish  in  memory  not  only  the 
achievements  of  their  heroes,  but  the  defeats  of 
their  martyrs;  and  when  the  trumpet- voice  shall 
summon  them  once  more,  as  surely  it  will,  — 
when  they  shall  draw  for  the  venture  of  freedom, 
and  unroll  its  glittering  standard  to  the  winds,  — 
tliey  will  avoid  the  stumbling-blocks  which  have 
sacrificed  the  brave,  and  the  errors  which  have 
postponed  former  hopes.     In  public  and  in  private 


68        THE    SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOINTMENT. 

action,  it  is  trae  that  disappointment  is  the  school 
of  achievement,  and, the  balked  efforts  are  the  very 
agents  that  help  us  to  our  purpose. 

And,  if  life  itself —  life  as  a  whole  —  seems  to 
us  but  a  series  of  disappointments,  is  not  this  the 
very  conviction  we  need  to  work  out  from  it, 
through  our  own  experience  ?  Do  we  not  need  to 
learn  that  this  life  itself  is  not  sufficient,  and  holds 
no  blessing  that  will  fill  us  completely,  and  with 
which  we  may  forever  rest  ?  The  baffled  hopes  of 
our  mortal  state ;  —  what  are  they  but  vain  striv- 
ings of  the  human  soul,  out  of  the  path  of  its 
highest  good?  The  wandering  bird,  driven  against 
the  branches,  and  beaten  by  the  storm,  flutters  at 
last  to  the  clear  opening,  by  which  it  mounts 
above  the  cloud,  and  finds  its  way  to  its  home. 
This  life  is  not  ordained  in  vain ;  —  it  is  con- 
stituted for  a  grand  purpose,  if  through  its 
lessons  of  experience  we  become  convinced  that 
this  life  is  not  all.  In  the  outset  of  our  exist- 
ence   here,    and    merely   from    the    teaching    of 


THE    SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOINTMENT.        59 

Others,  we   cannot  comprehend  the  great  realities 
of  existence. 

How  the  things  that  have  grown  familiar  to 
our  eyes,  and  the  lessons  that  have  sounded  trite 
upon  our  ears,  become  fresh  and  wonderful,  as 
life  turns  into  experience  !  How  this  very  lesson 
of  disappointment  lets  us  in  to  the  deep  meanings 
of  Scripture,  for  instance !  The  Christ  of  our 
youth,  —  a  personage  standing  mild  and  beautiful 
upon  the  Gospel-page,  —  a  being  to  admire  and 
love ;  how  he  developes  to  our  later  thought !  — 
how  solemnly  tender,  how  greatly  real,  he  becomes 
to  us,  when  we  cling  to  him  in  the  agony  of  our 
sorrow,  and  he  goes  down  to  walk  with  us  on  the 
waters  of  the  sea  of  death  !  As  traditional  senti- 
ment, —  as  a  wholesome  subject  for  school-com- 
position, —  we  have  spoken  and  written  of  the 
weariness  of  the  world-worn  heart,  and  the  frailty 
of  earthly  things.  But,  0  !  when  our  hearts  have 
actually  become  worn,  and  tried.;  when  we  begin 
to  learn  that  the  things  of  this  life  are  evanescent, 


CO        THE    SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOII^TMENT. 

—  are  dropping  away  from  us,  and  we  slipping 
from  them,  —  what  inspiration  of  reality  comes  to 
us  in  the  oft-heard  invitation,  ''  Come  unto  me,  all 
ye  that  labor  and  are  heavy-laden,  and  I  will  give 
you  rest"!  What  a  depth  of  meaning,  flowing 
from  the  eternal  world,  in  the  precept  we  have 
read  so  carelessly,  —  "  Lay  not  up  for  yourselves 
treasures  upon  earth,  where  moth  and  rust  doth 
corrupt,  and  thieves  break  through  and  steal "  ! 
Thus  the  best  results  of  life  come  from  the  defeats 
and  the  limitations  that  are  involved  with  it. 

And,  in  all  this,  observe  how  disappointment  is 
the  instrument  of  higher  blessings.  See  how  thus 
life  itself  suggests  a  higher  good  than  life  itself 
can  yield.  And  so  the  attitude  of  the  disciples, 
after  the  crucifixion,  illustrates  many  experiences 
of  our  earthly  lot.  Those  incidents  which  per- 
plexed and  grieved  them  were  securing  the  very 
results  they  seemed  to  prevent.  So,  in  our  ordi- 
nary life,  the  things  that  appear  most  adverse  to 
us  are  often  the  most  favorable. 


THE    SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOINTMENT.        61 

I  may  say,  indeed,  that  to  any  man  wlio  is 
rightly  exercised  by  it,  disappointment  always 
brings  a  better  result.  But  this  statement  re- 
quires that  I  should  say,  likewise,  that  the  result 
of  disappointment  depends  upon  the  level  and 
quality  of  a  man's  spirit.  "  One  thing  happens 
alike  to  the  wise  man  and  the  fool."  But  how 
different  in  texture  and  substance  is  the  final  result 
of  the  event !  Disappointment  breaks  down  a  feeble 
and  shallow  man.  There  are  those,  again,  whom  it 
does  not  make  better,  —  in  fact,  whom  nothing,  as 
we  can  see,  makes  better.  Everything  glides 
easily  off  from  them.  Now,  it  is  a  noble  thing  to 
see  a  man  rise  above  misfortune,  —  a  moral  Pro- 
metheus, submissive  to  the  actual  will  of  God,  but 
defying  fate.  But  there  are  men  whose  very 
elasticity  indicates  the  superficiality  of  their  na- 
ture. For  it  is  good  sometimes  to  be  sad,  —  good 
to  have  depth  of  being  suflBcient  for  misfortune  to 
sink  into,  and  accomplish  its  proper  work.  But 
the  man  who  rightly  receives  the  lesson  of  disap- 


62        THE    SHADOW    OF   DISAPPOINTMENT. 

pointment,  and  improves  by  its  discipline,  bent  as 
he  is  on  some  great  or  good  work,  is  impelled  by 
it  only  to  a  change  of  method,  —  never  to  a 
change  oi purpose  ;  and  the  disappointment  effect- 
ually serves  the  purpose.  But  the  fact  before  us 
is  most  clearly  seen  when  we  contemplate  the 
results  of  disappointment  upon  a  religious  and  an 
un-religious  spirit.  A  man-  is  not  made  better  by 
disappointment  to  whom  this  world  is  virtually 
everything ;  —  to  whom  spiritual  things  are  not 
realities.  To  him  life  is  a  narrow  stream  between 
jutting  crags,  and  its  substance  flows  away  with 
the  objects  before  his  eyes.  Nay,  some  men  of 
this  sort  are  made  worse  by  the  failure  of  earthly 
hopes,  and  their  natures  are  compressed  and  ham- 
mered by  misfortune  into  a  sullen  and  granitic 
defiance.  But  he  who  sees  beyond  these  material 
limits,  looking  to  the  great  end  and  final  relations 
of  our  being,  always  extracts  fi-om  mortal  disap- 
pointment a  better  result.  In  the  wreck  of  exter- 
nal things  he  gathers  that  spiritual  good  which  is 


THE   SHADOW    OF   DISAPPOINTMENT.        63 

the  substance  of  all  life; — that  faith,  and  patience, 
and  holy  love,  which,  when  all  that  is  mortal  and 
incidental  in  our  humanity  passes  away,  constitute 
the  residuum  of  personality. 

Ouj'  hopes  disappointed,  —  our  plans  thwarted 
and  overthrown ;  but  out  of  that  disappointment  a 
richer  good  evolving  than  we  had  conceived :  some- 
thing that  tends  more  than  all  our  eflFort  to  pro- 
duce the  real  object  of  life.  —  My  friends,  what  do 
we  make  out  of  this  fact  ?  Why,  surely  this,  that 
life  is  not  our  plan,  but  God's.  Consider  what 
we,  often,  would  have  made  out  of  life,  and  com- 
pare this  with  what  Providence  has  made  out  of  it. 
Contrast  the  man's  achievement  with  the  boy's 
scheme;  the  dream  of  care  with  the  moral  glory 
that  has  sprung  from  toil  and  trouble.  Contrast 
the  idea  of  the  Saviour  in  the  minds  of  those  disci- 
ples with  the  actual  Saviour  rising  victorious  from 
the  conditions  of  shame  and  death. 

Life  is  God's  plan ;  not  ours.  We  may  find 
this  out  only  by  effort ;   but  we  do  find  it  out. 


64        THE   SHADOW    OF    DISAPPOINTMENT. 

We  are  responsible  for  the  use  of  our  materials, 
but  the  materials  themselves,  and  the  great  move- 
ment of  things,  are  furnished  for  us.  Let  us  fall 
into  no  ascetic  view  of  life.  Out  of  our  joj  and 
our  acknowledged  good  the  Supreme  Disposer 
works  his  spiritual  ends.  But,  especially,  how 
often  does  he  do  this  out  of  our  trials,  and  sorrows, 
and  so-called  evils  !  Once  more  I  say  life  is 
God's  plan ;  not  ours.  For  often  on  the  ruins  of 
visionary  hope  rises  the  kingdom  of  our  substantial 
possession  and  our  true  peace;  and  under  the 
shadow  of  earthly  disappointment,  all  uncon- 
sciously to  ourselves,  our  Divine  Redeemer  is 
walking  by  our  side. 


lift  a  Sale. 


3^ 


We  spend  our  years  as  a  tale  that  is  told.    Psalm  xc.  9. 


E  bring  our  years  to  an  end  like  a 
thought,  is  the  proper  rendering  of 
these  words,  according  to  an  eminent  translator. 
But  as  the  essential  idea  of  the  Psalmist  is  pre- 
served in  the  common  version,  I  employ  it  as 
peculiarly  illustrative  and  forcible.  It  will  be  my 
object,  in  the  present  discourse,  to  show  the  fitness 
of  the  comparison  in  the  text ;  —  to  suggest  the 
points  of  resemblance  between  human  life  and  a 
passing  narrative. 

I  observe,  then,  in  the  first  place,  that  the  pro- 
priety of  this  simile  is  seen  in  the  brevity  of  life. 
What  more  rapid  and  momentary  than  a  story? 


68  LIFE    A    TALE. 

It  is  heard,  and  passes.  Though  it  beguiles  us  for 
the  time,  it  dies  away  in  sound,  or  melts  from 
before  the  eje.  And  this,  I  say,  strikingly  illus- 
trates the  brevity  of  life.  The  brevity  of  life ! 
It  is  a  trite  truth,  and  yet  how  little  realized ! 
Probably  there  is  nothing  more  common,  and  yet 
there  is  nothing  more  pernicious,  than  the  habit 
of  virtual  dependence  upon  length  of  days.  Thus 
the  best  ends  of  our  mortal  bcino;  are  lost  sight  of; 
the  solemn  circumstances,  the  suggestive  mysteries 
of  life,  are  misconstrued.  The  heavens,  which 
give  a  myriad  hints  of  worlds  beyond  the  grave, 
arc,  to  many,  impenetrable  walls,  shutting  them 
in  to  mere  pursuits  of  sense,  —  the  upholstery  of 
a  workshop  or  bazaar ;  and  this  earth,  which  is  but 
a  step,  —  a  filmy  platform  of  our  immortal  course, 
—  is  to  them  the  solid  abiding  place  of  all  interest, 
and  of  all  hope. 

It  is  well,  then,  to  break  in  upon  this  worldly 
reliance,  —  to  consider  how  fleeting  and  uncertain 
are  the  things  in  which  we  garner  up  so  much. 


LIFE   A    TALE.  69 

Therefore,  in  order  that  we  may  more  vividly 
realize  the  brevity  of  life,  —  how  like  it  is  to  a 
passing  tale,  —  let  us  consider  the  rapidity  of  its 
changes,  even  in  a  few  short  years.  We  are,  to 
some  degree,  made  aware  how  fast  the  current  of 
time  bears  us  on,  when  we  pause  and  remark  the 
shores ;  when  we  observe  how  our  position  to-day 
has  shifted  from  what  it  was  yesterday ;  how  the 
sunny  slopes  of  youth  have  been  changed  for  the 
teeming  uplands  of  maturity;  yea,  perhaps,  how 
already  the  stream  is  narrowing,  and  rushing  more 
swiftly  as  it  narrows,  towards  those  high  hills  that 
bound  our  present  vision,  upon  whose  summits 
lingers  the  departing  light,  and  around  whose  base 
thickens  the  solemn  shadow. 

This  rapidity  of  change  is  most  strikingly  illus- 
trated when,  after  a  few  years'  absence,  we  return 
to  the  scenes  of  our  youth.  We  plunged  into  the 
current  of  the  world,  buoyant  and  vigorous ;  our 
thoughts  have  been  occupied  every  hour,  and  we 
have  not   noticed   the   stealthy   shadow  of  time. 


ft  LIFE    A    TALE. 

But  we  come  back  to  that  early  spot,  and  look 
around.  Lo  !  the  companions  of  our  youth  have 
grown  into  dignified  men,  —  the  active  and  influ- 
ential citizens  of  the  place.     Care  has  set 

"  Busy  wrinkles  round  their  eyes." 

They  meet  us  with  formal  deportment,  or  with  an 
ill-concealed  restlessness,  as  though  we  hindered 
them  in  their  work,  —  luork !  which,  when  we 
parted  with  them,  would  have  been  flung  to  the 
winds  for  any  idle  sport.  How  quickly  they  have 
changed  into  this  gravity  and  anxiety !  On  the 
other  hand,  those  who  stood  where  they  stand 
now,  —  whoso  names  occupied  the  signs  and  the 
records  which  theirs  now  fill,  —  have  passed  away, 
or,  here  and  there,  come  tottering  along,  bent  and 
gray-headed  men.  Those,  too,  who  were  mere 
infants  —  those  whom  we  never  saw  —  take  up 
our  old  stations,  and  inspire  them  with  the  glad- 
ness of  childhood.      And   exactly  thus   have  ice 


LIFE    A    TALE.  71 

changed  to  others.      We  are  a  mirror  to  them, 
and  the  J  to  us. 

From  this  familiar  experience,  then,  let  us 
realize  that  the  stream  of  life  does  not  stop,  nor 
are  we  left  stationary,  but  carried  with  it ;  though 
our  condition  may  appear  unchanged,  until  we  lift 
up  our  eyes,  and  look  for  the  old  landmarks. 
The  brevity  of  our  life !  my  friends.  Amid  our 
daily  business,  —  in  the  sounding  tumult  of  the 
great  mart,  and  the  absorption  of  our  thoughts,  — 
do  we  think  of  it?  Do  we  perceive  how  nearly 
we  approach  a  goal  which  a  little  while  ago  seemed 
far  before  us?  Do  we  observe  how  quickly  we 
shoot  by  it  ?  Do  we  mark  with  what  increasing 
swiftness  the  line  of  our  life  seems  reeling  oflF,  and 
how  close  we  are  coming  to  the  end  ?  Time  never 
stops !  Each  tick  of  the  clock  echoes  our  advanc- 
ing footsteps.  The  shadow  of  the  dial  falls  upon  a. 
sliorter  and  a  shorter  tract,  which  we  have  yet  to 
pass  over.  Even  if  a  long  life  lies  before  us,  let 
us  consider  that  thirty-five  years  is  high  noon  with 


72  LIFE   A    TALE. 

US,  —  the  meridian  of  that  arc  which  comprehends 
but  threescore  years  and  ten  ! 

But  we  may  be  more  vividly  impressed  with 
the  fact  of  the  brevity  of  life,  if  we  adopt  some 
criterion  wider  than  these  familiar  measurements. 
The  narrative,  the  story,  engages  our  ears,  in  the 
pauses  of  care  and  labor.  We  listen  to  it  in  the 
noonday  rest,  and  around  the  evening  fire.  It  is 
a  slight  break  in  the  monotony  of  our  business,  — 
an  interlude  in  the  solemn  march  of  life.  And 
thus,  in  some  respects,  is  life  itself.  It  is  so,  if  we 
take  into  view  a  long  series  of  existence,  such  as 
the  succession  of  human  generations,  or,  still  more, 
the  periods  of  creative  development,  and  the  com- 
putations of  time  as  applied  to  the  forms  and 
changes  of  the  material  universe.  In  this  vast 
train  of  being,  our  individual  existence,  however 
important  to  ourselves,  is  but  an  interlude  —  a 
tale.  Let  us,  then,  for  a  while,  lay  aside  any 
conventional  method  of  estimating  our  life,  —  a 
method   in   which   that   life   fills   a   large  space, 


LIFE    A    TALE.  •  73 

simply  because  it  is  brought  near  to  the  eye,  — 
and  let  us  endeavor  to  take  a  view  of  it,  as  it 
were,  from  the  fixed  stars,  or  from  the  elevation 
of  the  immortal  state. 

Compare,  then,  if  you  will,  this  life  of  yours  or 
mine,  not  with  the  personal  standard  of  threescore 
years  and  ten,  but  with  the  whole  course  of  hu- 
man history ;  and  instantly  we  appear  but  as 
bubbles  in  the  stream  of  ages.  But,  again,  con- 
sider how  history  itself  is  as  "a  tale  that  is  told ;" 
and  then,  indeed,  what  a  mere  incident  in  it  all  is 
your  life  and  mine  !  If  we  stand  ofi"  at  the  dis- 
tance of  a  few  centuries,  so  that  we  have  no 
present  interest  in  them,  it  is  strange  how  the 
proudest  empires  assume  an  empty  and  spectral 
aspect.  Their  growth  and  decline  occupied  ages ; 
but  what  a  brief  achievement  it  appears  now  ! 
Why  puzzle  ourselves  about  their  origin,  or  seek 
to  disengage  the  true  from  the  fabulous  in  their 
history  ?  Why  strain  laboriously  to  settle  names, 
and   dates,  and  dynasties?     What  a  mere  point 


74  LIFE    A    TALE. 

they  have  occupied  in  the  processes  of  the  great 
universe !  Their  hieroglyphic  pillars,  their  gray 
old  pyramids ;  —  what  are  they  to  the  age  of 
Uranus,  or  the  new  planet?  Each  of  these  em- 
pires fulfilled  its  mission,  and  relatively  that  mis- 
sion was  a  great  one ;  but  in  the  long  sweep  of 
God's  providence,  and  among  the  phenomena  of 
absolute  being,  what  a  brief  link,  a  subordinate 
climax,  it  was !  The  huge  ribs  of  the  earth,  and 
the  coral  islands  of  the  sea,  were  longer  in  build- 
ing ;  and  even  these  are  transitory  manifestations 
of  God's  purposes,  which  stream  around  us  through 
constant  change  and  succession.  And  what,  then, 
are  these  nations  —  these  epochs  of  humanity  — 
but  waves  rising  and  breaking  on  the  great  sea  of 
eternity?  Mysterious  Egypt,  haughty  Assyria, 
glorious  Greece,  kingly  Rome :  —  how  spectral 
they  have  become.  They  stand  out  in  no  relief 
As  we  recede  from  them,  they  sink  back,  flat  and 
inanimate,  on  the  Iiorizon.  Each  is  a  tale  that 
has  been  told.     Surely,  then,  if  such  is  the  life  of 


LIFE   A    TALE.  76 

nations,  I  need  not  labor  to  impress  upon  you  a 
sense  of  the  brevity  of  our  individual  existence. 

But,  for  a  moment,  turn  your  thoughts  to  esti- 
mates that  far  exceed  the  periods  of  history,  and 
confound  all  our  ordinary  measurements.  What 
is  our  mortal  existence,  into  which  we  crowd  so 
much  interest,  —  over  the  anticipated  length  of 
which  we  slumber,  —  into  whose  uncertain  future 
we  project  our  little  plans  so  confidently,  —  com- 
pared to  the  age  of  the  heavens^  —  the  lifetime  of 
worlds  ?  —  compared  to  their  march,  from  the 
moment  when  they  obeyed  the  creative  fiat  to  that 
when  they  shall  complete  their  great  cycle  ?  It 
takes  three  years  for  light  to  travel  from  the 
nearest  fixed  star  to  the  earth ;  from  another  it 
takes  twelve  years ;  while,  on  its  journey  from  a 
star-  of  the  twelfth  magnitude,  twenty-four  billions 
of  miles  away,  it  consumes  four  thousand  years. 
And  yet  we  speak  of  long  life !  Why,  when 
the  light  that  wraps  us  now  shall  be  changed  for 
the  light  that  is  just  leaping  from  that  distant 


76  LIFE    A    TALE. 

star,  where  in  the  gray  bosom  of  the  past  shall  ice 
be  ?  Sunken,  forgotten,  crumbled  to  impercepti- 
ble atoms ;  the  ashes  of  generations  —  the  dust  of 
empires  —  heaped  over  us  !  And  when  we  com- 
pare these  wide  estimates  to  that  divine  eternity 
that  evolves  and  limits  all  things,  how  does  our 
individual  existence  on  the  earth  dwindle  and 
vanish  !  —  a  heart-throb  in  the  pulses  of  universal 
life,  —  a  quivering  leaf  in  the  forest  of  being,  — 
*'a  tale  that  is  told"! 

And  yet,  my  friends,  our  realization  of  exist- 
ence is  so  intense,  —  the  horizon  of  the  present 
shuts  us  in  so  completely,  —  that  it  really  requires 
an  effort  for  us  to  pause  and  remember  that  we  are 
such  transitory  beings.  It  cannot  be  (we  may 
unconsciously  reason),  that  we  to  whom  this  earth 
is  bound  with  ligaments  so  intimate  and  strong ; 
whose  breathing  and  motion  —  whose  contact  and 
action  here  —  are  such  realities ;  whose  ears  hear 
these  varying  sounds  of  life ;  whose  eyes  drink  in 
this   perpetual   and   changing   beauty;    to   whom 


LIFE    A    TALE.  77 

business,  study,  friendship,  pleasure,  domestic  rela- 
tions, are  such  fresh  and  constant  facts ;  to  whom 
the  dawn  and  the  twilight,  the  nightly  slumber 
and  the  daily  meal,  are  such  regular  experiences ; 
to  whom  our  possessions,  our  houses,  lands,  goods, 
money,  are  such  substantial  things ;  —  it  cannot  be 
that  we  are  not  fixed  permanently  here,  —  that 
the  years,  like  a  swift  river,  sweep  us  nearer  and 
nearer  to  a  point  where  we  must  sink  and  leave 
it  all,  —  that  the  corridors  of  the  earth  echo  our 
footsteps  only  as  the  footsteps  of  a  successive 
march  —  myriads  going  before,  and  myriads  com- 
ing after  us  —  and  soon  they  will  catch  no  more 
the  murmurs  of  our  individual  life ;  for  that  will 
be  as  "a  tale  that  is  told." 

The  whole  train  of  thought  I  am  now  pursuing 
strikes  us  with  peculiar  force,  in  reading  the  biog- 
raphies of  men  who  have  lived  intensely,  who  have 
realized  the  fulness  of  life,  who  have  mingled 
intimately  with  its  varied  experiences,  and  occu- 
pied a  large  place  in  it.     We  see  how  to  them 


78  LIFE   A   TALE. 

life  was,  as  it  is  to  us,  an  absorbing  fact,  —  how 
they  hare  planned,  and  thought,  and  acted,  as 
though  thej  were  to  live  forever ;  and  yet  we  have 
noticed  the  premonitions  of  change,  the  dropping 
away  of  friends,  the  failing  of  vigor,  the  deepening 
of  melancholy  shadows,  and  the  coming  of  the 
end ;  the  business  closed,  the  active  curiosity  and 
intermeddling  ceased,  the  familiar  haunts  aban- 
doned, the  home  made  desolate,  the  lights  put  out, 
the  cup  fallen  beneath  the  festal  board,  and  all 
that  earnest  existence  stopped  forever.  And  this, 
too,  so  quick,  —  filling  so  small  a  space  in  absolute 
time  !  From  their  illustration  let  us,  then,  real- 
ize that  our  life,  too,  amid  all  these  real  con- 
ditions, is  unfolding  rapidly  to  an  end,  and  is  "  as 
a  tale  that  is  told." 

But  life  is  like  a  tale  that  is  told,  because  of  its 
comprehensiveness.  It  is  a  common  character- 
istic of  a  narrative  that  it  contains  a  great  deal  in 
a  small  compass.  It  includes  many  years,  and 
expresses  many  results.     Sometimes  it  sweeps  over 


LIFE   A    TALE.  79 

diflFerent  lands,  and  exhibits  the  peculiarities  of 
various  personages.  In  one  word,  it  is  character- 
ized by  compreJienslve7iess.  And  this,  I  repeat, 
is  also  a  characteristic  of  human  life.  When  the 
consideration  of  the  brevity  of  our  mortal  existence 
excites  us  to  diligence  it  is  well;  but  when  *we 
make  it  an  argument  for  indolence,  disgust,  and 
despair,  we  should  be  reminded  of  the  fact  I  am 
now  endeavoring  to  illustrate,  —  the  fact  that  even 
the  briefest  life  contains  a  great  deal,  and  means  a 
great  deal ;  and  that,  if  we  estimate  things  by  a 
spb'itual  standard,  a  man's  earthly  being  may 
contain  more  than  all  the  cycles  of  the  material 
world.  From  the  best  point  of  view,  life  is  not 
merely  a  term  of  years  and  a  span  of  action ;  it  is 
a  force,  a  current  and  depth  of  being.  Indeed, 
considered  in  its  most  literal  sense,  as  the  vital 
spark  of  our  animal  organism,  it  is  something  more 
than  a  measurement  of  time ;  —  it  is  a  mysterious, 
informing  essence.  No  man  has  yet  been  able  to 
tell  us  what  it  is,  where  it  resides,  or  how  it  acts. 


80  LIFE   A   TALE. 

We  only  know  that  when  we  gaze  upon  the  fea- 
tures of  the  dead  we  see  there  the  same  organs 
that  pertained  to  the  living ;  but  something  has 
gone,  —  something  of  light,  power,  motion ;  and 
that  something  we  call  life. 

But  it  is  chiefly  in  a  moral  sense  that  I  make 
the  remark  that  life  is  something  more  than  a 
term  of  years,  or  a  span  of  action.  In  fact,  life 
is  a  sum  of  spiritttal  experiences  ;  and  thus  one 
act,  or  result,  often  contains  more  than  a  century 
of  time.  Who  does  not  understand  the  fact  to 
which  I  now  refer?  Who  has  not  felt  something 
of  it  ?  Has  not  each  one  of  us,  at  times,  realized 
that  he  lived  a  year  in  a  single  day,  —  in  a  mo- 
ment, —  in  an  emotion  or  thought  ?  Nay,  could 
that  experience  be  measured  by  any  estimate  of 
time  ?  And  if  we  should  compute  the  length  of 
any  life  by  such  experiences,  and  not  by  a  succes- 
sion of  years,  would  it  not  be  a  long  life  ?  At 
least,  would  it  not  be  a  full  and  immeasurable 
life? 


LIFE   A    TALE.  81 

But,  while  every  man's  history  will  furnish  in- 
stances of  what  I  mean,  let  us,  for  the  sake  of 
clearer  illustration,  consider  some  of  the  experi- 
ences which  are  common  to  all.  Defining  life  to 
be  depth  and  intensity  of  being,  then,  —  a  current 
of  spiritual  power,  and  not  a  mere,  succession  of 
incidents,  —  how  much  we  live  when  we  acquire 
the  knowledge  of  a  single  truth  !  What  an  inex- 
haustible power !  —  what  an  immeasurable  experi- 
ence it  is  !  We  are  made  absolutely  stronger  by 
it ;  Ave  receive  more  life  with  it,  —  a  new  and  im- 
perishable fibre  of  being.  Fortune  cannot  pluck  it 
from  us,  age  cannot  weaken  it,  death  cannot  set 
limits  to  it.  And  now,  with  the  fulness  of  this 
one  experience  as  a  test,  just  consider  our  whole 
mortal  experience  as  filled  up  with  such  revelations 
of  truth.  Suppose  we  improve  all  our  opportuni- 
ties ;  into  what  boundless  life  does  education  admit 
us,  and  the  discoveries  of  every  day,  and  the  ordi- 
nary lessons  of  the  world !  Tell  me,  is  this 
life  to  be  called  merely  a  brief  and  worthless  fact, 
6 


82  LIFE   A    TALE. 

when  by  a  little  reading,  for  instance,  I  can  make 
the  experience  of  other  men,  and  lands,  and  ages, 
all  mine?  When,  in  some  favored  hour,  I  can 
climb  the  starry  galaxy  with  Newton,  and  pace 
along  the  celestial  coast  to  the  great  harmony  of 
numbers,  and  unlock  the  mighty  secret  of  the  uni- 
verae?  When  of  a  winter's  night,  I  can  pass 
through  all  the  belts  of  climate,  and  all  the  grades 
of  civilization  on  our  globe  ;  scan  its  motley  races, 
learn  its  diverse  customs,  and  hear  the  groaning  of 
lonely  ice-fields  and  the  sigh  of  Indian  palms? 
When,  with  Bacon,  I  can  explore  the  laboratory  of 
nature,  or,  with  Locke,  consult  the  mysteries  of 
the  soul?  When  Spencer  can  lead  me  into 
golden  visions,  or  Shakspeare  smite  me  with  magic 
inspiration,  or  Milton  bathe  me  in  immortal  song  ? 
When  History  opens  for  me  all  the  gates  of  the 
past,  —  Thebes  and  Palmyra,  Corinth  and  Carth- 
age, Athens  with  its  peerless  glory,  and  Rome 
with  its  majestic  pomp  ?  —  when  kings  and  states- 
men, authors  and  priests,  with  their  public  deeds 


LIFE   A    TALE.  83 

and  secret  thoughts,  are  mine  ?  "When  the  plans 
of  cabinets,  and  the  debates  of  parliaments,  and  the 
course  of  revolutions,  and  the  results  of  battle,  are 
all  before  mj  ejes,  and  in  my  mind  ?  When  I 
can  enter  the  inner  chamber  of  sainted  souls,  and 
conspire  with  the  efforts  of  moral  heroes,  and 
understand  the  sufferings  of  martyrs  ?  Say,  when 
all  these  deep  experiences  —  these  comprehensive 
truths  —  may  be  acquired  through  merely  one 
privilege,  is  life  but  a  dream,  or  a  breath  of  air  ? 
Thus,  too,  do  immeasurable  experiences  flow  in 
to  me  from  nature,  —  from  planet,  flower,  and 
ocean.  Thus,  too,  does  more  life  come  to  me 
from  contacts  in  the  common  round  of  action. 
And,  I  repeat,  every  truth  thus  gained  expands 
a  moment  of  time  into  illimitable  being,  —  posi- 
tively enlarges  my  existence,  and  endows  me 
with  a  quality  which  time  cannot  weaken  or 
destroy. 

Consider,  again,  how  much  we  really  live  in 
cherishing  good   affections,   and   in   performing 


84  LIFE   A    TALE. 

•noble  deeds.  We  have  the  familiar  lines  of  the 
poet,  to  this  point : 

"  One  self-approving  hour  whole  years  outweighs 
Of  stupid  starers  and  of  loud  huzzas." 

It  is  true.  There  is  more  life  in  one  "  self- 
approving  hour,"  —  one  act  of  benevolence,  — 
one  work  of  self-discipline,  —  than  in  threescore 
years  and  ten  of  mere  sensual  existence.  Go  out 
among  the  homes  of  the  poor,  lift  up  the  disconso- 
late, administer  comfort  to  the  forlorn;  in  some 
way,  as  it  may  come  across  your  path,  or  lie  in 
the  sphere  of  your  duty,  do  a  deed  of  kindness ; 
and  in  that  one  act  you  shall  live  more  than  in  a 
year  of  selfish  indulgence  and  indolent  ease,  — 
yea,  more  than  in  a  lifetime  of  such.  The  poet, 
with  his  burning,  immortal  lines,  while  doing  his 
work,  lives  all  the  coming  ages  of  his  fame.  From 
every  marble  feature  that  he  chisels,  the  sculptor 
draws  an  intensity  of  being  that  cannot  be  imparted 
by  a  mere  extension  of  years.     The  philanthro- 


LIFE   A    TALE.  85 

pist,  in  his  walks  of  mercy  and  his  ministrations 
of  love,  lives  more  comprehensively  than  another 
may  in  a  century.  His  is  the  fathomless  bliss  of 
benevolence,  — the  experience  of  God.  The  mar- 
tyr, in  his  dying  hour,  with  his  face  shining  like 
an  angel's,  does  not  live  longer,  but  he  lives  wore, 
than  all  his  persecutors. 

Consider,  too,  the  experiences  of  religion,  of 
worship,  of  prayer.  In  the  act  of  communion 
with  God,  in  the  realization  of  immortality,  in  the 
aspirations  and  the  idea  of  perfection,  there  is  a 
depth  and  scope  of  being  from  which  all  sensual 
estimates  of  time  drop  away. 

Our  mortal  life,  then,  is  very  comprehensive. 
If  we  measure  it,  not  by  its  length  of  years,  but 
by  its  spiritual  results,  be  they  good  or  evil,  it  is 
a  full  and  large  life.  It  then  appears,  like  the 
immortal  state,  not  as  a  fact  of  succession,  but  of 
experience.  Christ  has  defined  eternal  life  as 
such  a  fact.  "  Eternal  life,"  he  says,  "  is  to  know 
thee,  the  only  true  God,  and  Jesus  Christ  whom 


86  LIFE   A    TALE. 

thou  hast  sent."  The  life  of  the  blessed  in  heaven 
is  not  marked  by  years  and  cycles ;  it  is  not  so 
much  protracted  being,  as  a  power  of  knowledge, 
—  a  depth  of  glad  and  holy  consciousness,  —  a 
constant  pulsation  of  harmony  with  God. 

Again,  every  life  may  be  compared  to  "  a  tale 
that  is  told,"  because  it  has  a  plot.  In  the  narra- 
tive there  is  a  combination  of  agencies  working  to 
a  crisis.  There  is  a  main-point  with  which  all  the 
action  is  involved.  And  so  every  human  life  has 
its  main-point.  I  will  not  now  take  up  time  to 
carry  out  this  illustration  minutely.  The  mere 
suggestion  that  each  one  is  working  out  a  peculiar 
destiny  invests  even  the  meanest  life  with  a  solemn 
dignity,  and  counteracts  any  disparaging  argument 
drawn  from  its  brevity. 

But  still  I  would  urge,  that  the  propriety  of 
this  comparison  between  the  peculiar  tendency  of 
an  individual  life  and  the  plot  of  a  story,  is  seen 
in  the  fact  that  every  man  is  accomplishing  a  cer- 
tain moral  result  in  and  for  himself.     This  is  inev- 


LIFE   A    TALE.  87 

itable.  We  may  be  inactive,  but  that  result  is 
forming ;  the  mould  of  habit  is  growing,  and  the 
inward  life  is  unfolding  itself,  after  its  kind.  We 
may  think  our  career  is  aimless,  but  all  things 
give  a  shape  to  our  character.  And  does  not  this 
consideration  make  our  mortal  life  of  deep  conse- 
quence to  us  ? 

All  circumstances  and  experiences  are  chiefly 
important  as  afiecting  this  result.  One  of  the 
highest  views  we  can  take  of  the  universe  is  that 
of  a  theatre  for  the  soul's  education.  We  are 
placed  upon  this  earth  not  to  be  absorbed  by  it, 
but  to  use  it  for  the  highest  spiritual  occasions. 
We  are  placed  among  the  joys  and  sorrows  of  our 
daily  lives  to  be  trained  for  immortal  issues.  Our 
business,  our  domestic  duties,  and  all  our  various 
relations,  constitute  a  school  for  our  souls.  Here 
our  affections  and  our  powers  are  acted  upon  for 
good  or  for  evil.  Grief  strengthens  our  faith  and 
elevates  our  thoughts ;  joy  quickens  our  gratitude, 
our  obedience,  and  our  trust ;  temptation  forms  in 


88  LIFE   A   TALE. 

US  an  exalted  and  spontaneous  virtue,  or  enfeebles 
and  enslaves  us.  Chiefly,  then,  should  we  be 
solicitous  about  character,  the  plot  of  our  life ;  and 
in  this  solicitude  our  earthly  existence  rises  to  the 
highest  importance. 

Let  us,  then,  feel  that  our  mortal  career  is  not 
vague  and  aimless.  Let  us  realize  that  each  life  is 
a  special  history.  The  poorest,  the  most  obscure, 
has  such  a  history ;  and  although  it  may  be  un- 
noticed by  men,  angels  regard  it  with  interest. 
The  merchant,  every  day,  in  the  dust,  and  heat, 
and  busy  maze  of  traffic,  unfolds  a  history.  The 
beggar  by  the  way-side,  it  may  be,  outrivals  kings 
in  the  grandeur  and  magnitude  of  his  history.  In 
sainted  homes,  —  in  narrow  nooks  of  life,  —  in  the 
secret  heart  of  love,  and  prayer,  and  patience,  — 
many  a  tale  is  told  which  God  alone  sees,  and 
which  he  approves.  The  needy  tell  a  tale,  in 
their  unrelieved  wants  and  unpitied  sufferings. 
The  oppressed  tell  a  tale,  that  goes  up  into  the 
ears  of  the  Lord  of  Sabaoth.     The  vicious  tell  a 


LIFE   A    TALE.  89 

tale  of  WO,  and  misspent  opportunity,  and  wasted 
power.  Let  us  think  of  it,  I  beseech  you !  Each 
one  of  us  in  his  sphere  of  action  is  developing  a 
plot  which  surely  tells  in  character,  —  which  is 
fast  running  into  a  great  fixed  fact. 

Once  more,  we  may  compare  every  life  to  "a  tale 
that  is  told,"  because  it  has  a  Tnoral.  Any  story, 
good  or  bad,  —  the  most  pernicious  work  of  fiction, 
the  most  flimsy  narrative,  as  the  grandest  history, 

—  has  its  significance.  So  it  is  with  the  life  of  a 
man.  As  in  all  his  conduct  he  is  building  up  the 
intrinsic  results  of  character  for  himself,  —  estab- 
lishing in  his  own  soul  a  fabric  of  welfare  or  of  wo, 

—  so  is  he  furnishing  a  lesson  for  others,  and 
accomplishing  an  end  by  which  they  are  afiected. 
The  purpose  for  which  any  one  has  lived,  the 
point  which  he  has  attained,  the  personal  history 
which  he  has  unfolded,  constitute  the  moral  of  his 
life. 

For  instance,  here  is  a  man  whoso  life  is  frivo- 
lous, —  divided  between  aimless  cares  and  super- 


90  LIFE   A    TALE. 

ficial  enjoyments.  He  has  no  resources  in  himself, 
no  fountain  of  inward  peace  and  joj.  His  spirit 
leaps  like  new  wine  in  the  whirl  of  exciting  pleas- 
ure, hut  in  the  hour  of  solitude  and  of  golden 
opportunity,  it  is  "flat,  stale,  and  unprofitable." 
He  marks  off  the  year  by  its  festivals,  and  distrib- 
utes the  day  into  hours  of  food,  rest,  and  folly. 
In  short,  he  holds  no  serious  conception  of  life,  and 
he  is  untouched  by  lofty  sentiment.  The  great 
drama  of  existence,  with  its  solemn  shifts  of  scenery 
and  its  impending  grandeur,  is  but  a  pantomime  to 
him;  and  he  a  thoughtless  epicurean,  a  grinning 
courtier,  a  scented  fop,  a  dancing  puppet,  on  the 
mighty  stage.  And  surely,  such  a  life,  a  life  of 
superficiality  and  heartlessness,  a  life  of  silken 
niceties  and  conventional  masquerade,  a  life  of 
sparkling  effervescence,  has  a  moral.  It  shows  us 
how  vain  is  human  existence  when  empty  of 
serious  thought,  of  moral  purpose,  and  of  devout 
emotion. 

Another  is  a  skeptic.     He  has  no  genuine  faith 


I 


LIFE  A   TALE.  91 

in  immortality,  in  virtue,  or  in  God.  To  him,  life  is 
a  sensual  opportunity  closing  up  with  annihilation, 
and  to  be  enjoyed  as  it  may.  It  is  a  mere  game, 
and  he  who  plays  the  most  skilful  hand  will  win. 
Virtue  is  a  smooth  decency,  which  it  is  well  to 
assume  in  order  to  cover  an  artful  selfishness ;  and 
it  is  a  noteworthy  fact,  too,  that,  in  the  long  run, 
those  who  have  trusted  to  virtue  have  made  by  it. 
At  least,  vice  is  inexpedient,  and  it  will  not  do  to 
make  a  public  profession  of  it.  Religion,  too,  he 
says,  is  well  enough  ;  it  does  for  the  weak  and  the 
ignorant;  though  shrewd  men,  like  our  skeptic, 
know  that  it  is  all  a  sham,  and,  of  course,  scarce 
give  it  a  serious  thought.  What  is  religion  to  a 
keen-minded,  hard-headed,  sagacious  man  of  the 
world?  What  has  it  to  do  with  business,  and 
politics,  and  such  practical  matters?  Pack  it 
away  for  Sunday,  and  then  put  it  on  with  clean 
clothes,  out  of  respect  for  the  world ;  but  if  it  lifts 
any  remonstrance  in  the  caucus  or  the  counting- 
room,  why,  like  a  shrewd  man,  laugh  it  out  of 


92  LIFE   A    TALE. 

countenance.  What  has  our  skeptic  to  do  with 
the  future  world  or  with  spiritual  relations? 
Keep  bugbears  to  frighten  more  timid  and  credu- 
lous persons.  But  only  see  how  he  uses  the  world, 
and  plays  his  scheme,  and  foils  his  adversary,  and 
twists  and  bends  his  plastic  morality,  all  because 
he  is  not  troubled  with  scniples,  and  has  no  faith 
in  God  or  duty ! 

And  yet,  to  the  serious  eye,  that  scans  his  spir- 
itual mood,  and  looks  all  around  his  shrewd,  self- 
confident  position,  there  is  a  great  moral  in  that 
skeptic's  life.  It  teaches  us,  more  than  ever,  the 
value  of  faith,  and  the  glory  of  religion.  That  flat 
negation  only  makes  the  rejected  truth  more  posi- 
tive. That  specimen  of  what  existence  is  without 
God  in  the  world,  causes  us  to  yearn  more  ear- 
nestly for  the  shelter  of  His  presence,  and  the  bles- 
sedness of  His  control.  From  the  dark  perspective 
of  the  skeptic's  sensual  view,  the  bleak  annihilation 
that  bounds  all  his  hopes,  we  turn  more  gladly  to  the 
auroral  promise  of  immortality,  to  the  consolations 


LIFE   A    TALE.  93 

and  influences  of  a  life  beyond  the  grave.  Yes,  in 
that  tale  that  is  told,  in  that  skeptic  history,  there 
is  indeed  a  great  moral.  It  shows  how  meaning- 
less and  how  mean,  how  treacherous  and  false,  is 
that  man's  life  who  hangs  upon  the  balance  of  a 
cunning  egotism,  and  moves  only  from  the  impulses 
of  selfish  desire — without  religion,  without  virtue, 
repudiating  the  idea  of  morality,  and  practically 
living  without  God. 

Or,  on  the  other  hand,  suppose  we  call  up  the 
image  of  one  who  has  well  kept  the  trusts  of  fam- 
ily, and  kindred,  and  friendship;  —  one  who  has 
made  home  a  pleasant  place ;  who  has  filled  it  with 
the  sanctities  of  affection,  and  adorned  it  with  a 
graceful  and  generous  hospitality ;  —  before  whose 
cheerful  temper  the  perplexities  of  business  have 
been  smoothed,  and  whose  genial  disposition  has 
melted  even  the  stem  and  selfish ;  —  who,  thus 
rendering  life  around  her  happier  and  better, 
attracting  more  closely  the  hearts  of  relatives,  and 
making  every  acquaintance  a  friend,   has,   chief 


94  LIFE   A    TALE. 

of  all,  beautifully  discharged  the  sacred  offices  of 
wife  and  mother ;  encountering  the  day  of 
adversity  with  a  noble  self-devotion,  enriching  the 
hour  of  prosperity  with  wise  counsel  and  faithful 
love;  unwearied  in  the  time  of  sickness,  patient 
and  trustful  beneath  the  dispensation  of  affliction  ; 
in  short,  by  her  many  virtues  and  graces  evidently 
the  bright  centre  of  a  happy  household.  And  now 
suppose  that,  with  all  these  associations  clinging  to 
her,  in  the  bloom  of  life,  with  opportunities  for 
usefulness  and  enjoyment  opening  all  around  her, 
death  interferes,  and  suddenly  quenches  that  light! 
Is  there  not  left  a  moral  in  which  abides  a  sweet 
and  lasting  consolation?  That  moral  is  —  the 
power  of  a  kind  heart ;  the  worth  of  domestic 
virtues ;  the  living  freshness  of  a  memory  in  which 
these  qualities  are  combined. 

Thus,  then,  in  its  brevity  and  its  comprehen- 
siveness^ with  its  plot  and  its  m^ral,  we  see  that 
each  human  life  is  like  "a  tale  that  is  told."  To 
you,  my  friends,  I  leave  the  personal  application 


LIFE   A    TALE.  95 

of  these  truths.  Surely  they  suggest  to  each  of  us 
the  most  vital  and  solemn  considerations.  Surely 
they  call  us  to  diligence  and  repentance,  —  to  in- 
trospection and  prayer.  What  we  are  in  our- 
selves^ —  what  use  we  shall  make  of  life ;  —  is  not 
this  an  all  important  subject  ?  What  lesson  we 
shall  furnish  for  others,  —  what  influence  for  good 
or  evil ;  —  can  we  be  indifierent  to  that  ?  God 
give  us  grace  and  strength  to  ponder  and  to  act 
upon  these  suggestions ! 

Finally,  remember  under  whose  dominion  all 
the  sorrows  and  changes  of  earth  take  place.  Let 
your  faith  in  Him  be  firm  and  clear.  To  Him 
address  your  grief ;  —  to  Him  lift  up  your  prayer. 
Of  Him  seek  strength  and  consolation ;  —  of  Him 
ask  that  a  holy  influence  may  attend  every  ex- 
perience. And  while  all  the  trials  of  life  should 
quicken  us  to  a  loftier  diligence,  and  inspire  us 
with  a  keener  sense  of  personal  responsibility, 
surely  when  our  hearts  are  sore  and  bleeding,  — 
when  our  hopes  lie  prostrate,  and  we  are  faint  and 


> 


96  LIFE   A   TALE. 

troubled,  it  is  good  to  rise  to  the  contemplation  of 
the  Infinite  Controller,  —  to  lean  back  upon  the 
Almighty  Groodness  that  upholds  the  universe ;  to 
realize  that  He  does  verily  watch  over  us,  and  care 
for  us ;  to  feel  that  around  and  above  all  things 
else  He  moves  the  vast  circle  of  his  purpose, "and 
carries  within  it  all  our  joys  and  sorrows ;  and  that 
this  mysterious  tale  of  human  life  —  this  tangled 
plot  of  our  earthly  being — is  unfolded  beneath  His 
all-beholding  eye,  and  by  His  omnipotent  and  pa- 
ternal hand. 


®i|e  Christian  Wub  d  Sorrota. 


A  man  of  sorrows,  and  acquainted  with  grief.     Is.  liii.  3. 


'HERE  is  one  great  distinction  between  the 
productions  of  Heathen  and  of  Christian 
art.  While  the  first  exhibits  the  perfection  of 
physical  form  and  of  intellectual  beauty,  the  latter 
expresses,  also,  the  majesty  of  sorrow,  the  grand- 
eur of  endurance,  the  idea  of  triumph  refined 
from  agony.  In  all  those  shapes  of  old  there 
is  nothing  like  the  glory  of  the  martyr;  the 
sublimity  of  patience  and  resignation ;  the  dignity 
of  the  thorn-crowned  Jesus. 

It  is  easy  to  account  for  this.  In  that  heathen 
age  the  soul  had  received  no  higher  inspiration. 
It  was  only  after  the  advent  of  Christ  that  men 


100  CHRISTIAN   VIEW    OF    SORROW. 

realized  the  greatness  of  sorrow  and  endurance. 
It  was  not  until  the  history  of  the  Garden,  the 
Judgment-Hall,  and  the  Cross  had  been  devel- 
oped, that  genius  caught  nobler  conceptions  of 
the  beautiful.  This  fact  is,  therefore,  a  powerful 
witness  to  the  prophecy  in  the  text,  and  to  the 
truth  of  Christianity.  Christ's  personality,  as 
delineated  in  the  Gospels,  is  not  only  demon- 
strated by  a  change  of  dynasties,  —  an  entire 
new  movement  in  the  world,  —  a  breaking  up 
of  its  ancient  order;  but  the  moral  ideal  which 
now  leads  human  action,  —  which  has  wrought 
this  enthusiasm,  and  propelled  man  thus  strangely 
forward,  —  has  entered  the  subjective  realities  of 
the  soul,  —  breathed  a  new  inspiration  upon  it, 
—  opened  up  to  it  a  new  conception ;  and,  lo ! 
the  statue  dilates  with  a  diviner  expression ;  — 
lo !  the  picture  wears  a  more  lustrous  and  spirit- 
ual beauty. 

The  Christ  of  the  text,  then,  —  "A  man  of 
sorrows,  and  acquainted  with  grief,"  —  has  verily 


CHRISTIAN    VIEW    OF    SORROW.  101 

lived ;  for  his  image  has  been  reflected  in  the  minds 
of  men,  and  has  fastened  itself  there  among  their 
most  intimate  and  vivid  conceptions.  Sorrow,  as 
illustrated  in  Christ's  life,  and  as  interpreted  in  his 
scheme  of  religion,  has  assumed  a  new  aspect,  and 
yields  a  new  meaning.  Its  garments  of  heaviness 
have  become  transfigured  to  robes  of  light,  its 
crown  of  thorns  to  a  diadem  of  glory ;  and  often, 
for  some  one  whom  the  rich  and  joyful  of  this 
world  pity,  —  some  suffering,  struggling,  over- 
shadowed soul,  —  comes  there  a  voice  from  heaven, 
"  This  is  my  beloved  son,  in  whom  I  am  well 
pleased." 

I  remark,  however,  that  Christianity  does  not 
accomplish  this  result  by  denying  the  character 
of  sorrow.  It  does  not  refuse  to  render  homage  to 
grief  The  stoic  is  as  far  from  its  ideal  of  virtue 
as  the  epicurean.  The  heart  of  the  true  saint 
quivers  at  pain,  and  his  eyes  are  filled  with  tears. 
Whatever  mortifications  he  may  deem  necessary  as 
to  the  passions  of  this  poor  flesh,  if  he  imitates 


102  CHRISTIAN   VIEW    OF    SORROW. 

the  example  of  Christ  he  cannot  deny  those  better 
affections  which  link  us  even  to  God ;  he  cannot 
harden  those  sensitive  fibres  which  are  the  springs 
of  our  best  action,  —  which  if  callus  we  become  in- 
human. He  realizes  pain ;  he  recognises  sorrow  as 
sorrow.  Its  cup  is  bitter,  and  to  be  resisted  with 
prayer. 

There  is  nothing  more  wonderful  in  the  history 
of  Jesus  than  his  keen  sense  of  sorrow,  and  the 
scope  which  he  allows  it.  In  the  tenderness  of  his 
compassion  he  soothed  the  overflowing  spirit,  but 
he  never  rebuked  its  tears.  On  the  contrary,  in  a 
most  memorable  instance,  he  recognized  its  right 
to  grieve.  It  was  on  the  way  to  his  own  cruci- 
fixion, when  crowned  with  insult,  and  lacerated 
with  his  own  sorrows.  "  Daughters  of  Jerusa- 
lem," said  he,  to  the  sympathizing  women,  "  weep 
not  for  me,  but  weep  for  yourselves  and  for  your 
children."  As  though  he  had  said,  "You  have  a 
right  to  weep ;  weep,  then,  in  that  great  catastro- 
phe which  is  coming,  when  barbed  affliction  shall 


CHRISTIAN    VIEW    OF    SORROW.  103 

pierce  your  hearts,  and  the  dearest  ties  shall  be 
cut  in  sunder.  Those  ties  are  tender ;  those  hearts 
are  sacred.     Therefore,  weep!" 

But  Christ  did  more  than  sanction  tears  in 
others.  He  wept  himself.  Closest  in  our  con- 
sciousness, because  they  will  be  most  vivid  to  us  in 
our  darkest  and  our  last  hours,  are  those  incidents 
by  the  grave  of  Lazarus,  and  over  against  Jerusa- 
lem ;  the  sadness  of  Gethsemane,  and  the  divine 
pathos  of  the  last  supper.  Never  can  we  fully 
realize  what  a  tribute  to  sorrow  is  rendered  by  the 
tears  of  Jesus,  and  the  dignity  which  has  de- 
scended upon  those  who  mourn,  because  he  had 
not  where  to  lay  his  head,  was  despised  and  re- 
jected of  men,  and  cried  out  in  bitter  agony  from 
the  cross.  He  could  not  have  been  our  exemplar 
by  despising  sorrow  —  by  treating  it  with  con- 
tempt ;  but  only  by  shrinking  from  its  pain,  and 
becoming  intimate  with  its  anguish, — only  as  "a 
man  of  sorrows,  and  acquainted  with  grief" 

But,  on  the  other  hand,  Christianity  does  not 


104  CHRISTIAN   VIEW    OF    SORROW. 

over-estimate  sorrow.  While  it  pronounces  a 
benediction  upon  the  mourner,  it  does  not  declare 
it  best  that  man  should  always  mourn.  It  would 
not  have  us  deny  the  good  that  is  in  the  universe. 
Nay,  I  apprehend  that  sorrow  itself  is  a  testimony 
to  that  good,  —  is  the  anguish  and  shrinking  of 
the  severed  ties  that  have  bound  us  to  it :  that  it 
clings  closest  in  hearts  of  the  widest  and  most  va- 
rious sympathies ;  that  only  souls  which  have  loved 
much  and  enjoyed  much  can  feel  its  intensity,  or 
know  its  discipline.  In  the  language  of  another, 
"  Sorrow  is  not  an   independent  state  of  mind, 

standing  unconnected  with  all  others It 

is  the  effect,  and,  under  the  present  conditions  of 
our  being,  the  inevitable  effect,  of  strong  affections. 
Nay,  it  is  not  so  much  their  result,  as  a  certain 
attitude  of  those  affections  themselves.  It  not 
simply  flows  from  the  love  of  excellence,  of  wis- 
dom, of  sympathy,  but  it  is  that  very  love,  when 
conscious  that  excellence,  that  wisdom,  that  sym- 
pathy, have  departed."     Tbey,  then,  who  deem  it 


CHRISTIAN    VIEW    OF   SORROW.  105 

necessary  for  man's  spiritual  welfare  that  he  should 
constantly  feel  the  pressure  of  chastisement,  and  be 
engirt  with  the  mist  of  tears,  do  not  reason  well. 
Jeremy  Taylor  reasons  thus,  when  he  says,  in 
allusion  to  certain  lamps  which  burned  for  many 
ages  in  a  tomb,  but  which  expired  when  brought 
into  open  day :  —  "So  long  as  we  are  in  the  re- 
tirements of  sorrow,  of  want,  of  fear,  of  sickness, 
we  are  burning  and  shining  lamps ;  but  when  God 
lifts  us  up  from  the  gates  of  death,  and  carries  us 
abroad  into  the  open  air,  to  converse  with  pros- 
perity and  temptations,  we  go  out  in  darkness; 
and  we  cannot  be  preserved  in  light  and  heat  but 
by  still  dwelling  in  the  regions  of  sorrow." 
"  There  is  beauty,  and,  to  a  certain  extent,  truth, 
in  this  figure,"  says  a  writer,  in  reply;  "but  it  by 
no  means  follows  that  continuous  suffering  would 
be  good  for  man ;  on  the  contrary,  it  would  be  as 
remote  from  producing  the  perfection  of  our  moral 
nature  as  unmitigated  prosperity.  It  would  be  apt 
to  produce  a  morbid  and  ghastly  piety;  the  'bright 


106  CHRISTIAN   VIEW    OF    SORROW. 

lamps'  of  which  Taylor  speaks,  would  still  be 
irradiating  only  a  tomb."*  We  may  doubt 
whether  there  is  more  essential  religiousness  in 
this  seeking  of  sorrow  as  a  mortification,  —  in 
this  monastic  self-laceration  and  exclusion,  —  than 
in  the  morbid  misery  of  the  hypochondriac.  Nei- 
ther comprehends  the  whole  of  life,  nor  is  adapted 
to  its  realities.  Christ  was  "a  man  of  sorrows 
and  acquainted  with  grief;"  but  he  was  also  full 
of  sympathy  with  all  good,  and  enjoyed  the  charm 
of  friendship,  and  the  light  of  existence.  Around 
that  great  Life  gather  many  amenities.  Below 
that  face  of  agony  beats  a  heart  familiar  with  the 
best  affections  of  human  nature ;  otherwise,  we 
may  believe,  that  agony  would  not  appear.  The 
sadness  of  that  last  supper  indicates  the  breaking 
up  of  many  joyful  communions  ;  and  that  history 
which  closes  in  the  shadow  of  the  cross  mingles 
with  the  festival  of  Cana,  and  lingers  around  the 
home  at  Bethany. 

•  Edinburgh  Review,  No.  141.     The  article  on  Pascal. 


CHRISTIAN    VIEW    OF    SORROW.  107 

But  I  remark,  once  more,  that  while  Christi- 
anity neither  despises  nor  affects  to  desire  sorrow, 
it  clearly  recognizes  its  great  and  beneficial  mis- 
sion. In  one  word,  it  shows  its  disciplifiary 
character,  and  thus  practically  interprets  the  mys- 
tery of  evil.  It  regards  man  as  a  spiritual  being, 
thrown  upon  the  theatre  of  this  mortal  life  not 
merely  for  enjoyment,  but  for  training^  —  for  the 
development  of  spiritual  affinities,  and  the  attain- 
ment of  spiritual  ends.  It  thus  reveals  a  wean- 
ing, subduing,  elevating  power,  in  sorrow. 

The  origin  of  evil  may  puzzle  us ;  —  its  use  no 
Christian  can  deny.  A  sensual  philosophy  may 
shrink  from  it,  in  all  its  aspects,  and  retreat  into 
a  morbid  scepticism  or  a  timid  submission.  If  we 
predicate  mere  happiness  as  "  our  being's  end  and 
aim,"  there  is  no  explanation  of  evil.  From  this 
point  of  view,  there  is  an  ambiguity  in  nature,  — 
a  duality  in  every  object,  which  we  cannot  solve. 
The  throne  of  infinite  light  and  love  casts  over 
the  face  of  creation  an  inexplicable  shadow.     If 


108  CHRISTIAN   VIEW    OF    SORROW. 

we  were  made  merely  to  be  happy,  why  this  hos- 
tility all  around  us?  Why  these  sharp  opposi- 
tions of  pain  and  difficulty  ?  Why  these  writhing 
nerves,  these  aching  hearts,  and  over-laden  eyes? 
Why  the  chill  of  disappointment,  the  shudder  of 
remorse,  the  crush  and  blight  of  hope?  Why 
athwart  the  horizon  flicker  so  many  shapes  of 
misery  and  sin  ?  Why  appear  these  sad  spectacles 
of  painful  dying  chambers,  and  weary  sick-beds? 
—  these  countless  tomb-stones,  too  —  ghastly  wit- 
nesses to  death  and  tears  ?  Explain  for  me  these 
abrupt  inequalities,  —  the  long  train  of  necessi- 
ties, poverty  and  its  kindred  woes,  those  fearful 
realities  that  lie  in  the  abysses  of  every  city,  — 
that  hideous,  compressed  mass  which  welters  in 
the  awful  baptism  of  sensuality  and  ignorance,  — 
the  groans  of  inarticulate  woe,  the  spectacle  of 
oppression,  the  shameless  cruelty  of  war,  the  pes- 
tilence that  shakes  its  comet-sword  over  nations, 
and  famine  that  peers  with  skeleton  face  through 
the  corn-sheaves  of  plenty.     Upon  this-  theory  of 


CHRISTIAN   VIEW    OF    SORROW.  109 

mer&  happiness  no  metaphysical  subtlety  can  solve 
the  fact  of  evil ;  —  the  coiled  enigma  constantly 
returns  upon  itself,  inexplicable  as  ever. 

But  when  we  take  the  Christian  view  of  life, 
we  discover  that  not  happiness  merely,  but  virtue, 
holiness,  is  the  great  end  of  man ;  though  happi- 
ness comes  in  as  an  inevitable  consequence  and 
accompaniment  of  this  result.  And  in  the  light 
reflected  from  this  view,  evil  assumes  a  powerful, 
and,  I  may  say,  a  most  beautiful  office.  It  is  just 
as  necessary  for  the  attainment  of  virtue  as  pros- 
perity, or  any  blessing.  Nay,  in  this  aspect,  it  is 
itself  a  great  blessing,  and 

"Every  cloud  that  spreads  above 
And  veileth  love,  itself  is  love." 

It  is  evident  that,  without  the  contact  of  sin 
and  the  pressure  of  temptation,  there  might  be 
innocence,  but  not  virtue.  Equally  evident  does 
it  seem  that,  without  an  acquaintance  with  grief, 
there  would  be  but  little  of  that  uplifting  ten- 


110  CHRISTIAN    VIEW    OF    SORROW. 

dency  —  that  softening  of  the  heart,  and  sanctify- 
ing of  the  aifections  —  which  fit  us  for  the  dissolu- 
tion of  our  earthly  ties,  and  for  the  communions 
of  the  spiritual  world.  Beautiful  is  this  weaning 
efficacy  of  sorrow.  By  the  ordinance  of  God, 
youth  is  made  to  he  content  with  this  outward  and 
palpable  life.  The  sunshine  and  the  air  —  the 
flow  of  animal  pleasures,  encircled  mysteriously 
with  the  guardianship  of  parents,  and  the  love  of 
friends  —  are  sufficient  for  the  child.  But  as  we 
grow  in  years,  there  springs  up  a  dissatisfaction, 
a  restlessness,  of  which  we  may  be  only  half  con- 
scious, and  still  less  know  how  to  cure.  With 
some,  this  may  subside  into  merely  a  fearful  and 
worldly  discontent ;  others  may  heed  the  prophecy, 
and  lay  hold  on  a  celestial  hope,  an  immortal  pos- 
session, as  the  only  remedy.  In  this  secret  sense 
of  want,  which  neither  nature  nor  man  can  fill, 
they  will  hear  already  that  low,  divine  voice,  — 
"  Come  unto  me,  all  ye  that  labor  and  are  heavy 
laden,  and  I  will  give  you  rest."     But  generally 


CHRISTIAN    VIEW    OF    SORROW.  Ill 

another  and  more  emphatic  missionary  is  neces- 
sary. It  is  the  veiled  angel  of  sorrow,  who  plucks 
away  one  thing  and  another  that  hound  us  here  in 
ease  and  security,  and  in  the  vanishing  of  these 
dear  objects  indicates  the  true  home  of  our  afiec- 
tions  and  our  peace.  Thus,  by  rupture  and  loss 
we  become  weaned  from  earth,  and  the  dissatis- 
faction and  discontent  which  sorrow  thus  induces 
are  as  kind  and  providential  as  the  carelessness  of 
youth. 

Who  does  not  see  that  it  is  so,  —  that  as  we 
journey  on  in  life  there  are  made  in  our  behalf 
preparations  for  another  state  of  being,  —  unmis- 
takable premonitions  of  that  fact  which  the  author 
of  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  so  eloquently  states, 
that  '"here  have  we  no  continuing  city"?  The 
gloss  of  objects  in  which  we  delighted  is  worn  oflf 
by  attrition,  —  is  sicklied  o'er  by  care ;  the  vanity 
of  eartlily  things  startles  us  suddenly,  like  a  new 
truth ;  the  friends  we  love  drop  away  from  our  side 
into  silence ;  desire  fails ;  the  grasshopper  becomes 


112  CHRISTUN    VIEW    OF    SORROW. 

a  burden ;  until,  at  length,  we  feel  that  our  only 
love  is  not  here  below,  —  until  these  tendrils  of 
earth  aspire  to  a  better  climate,  and  the  weight 
that  has  been  laid  upon  us  makes  us  stoop  wearily 
to  the  grave  as  a  rest  and  a  deliverance.  We 
have,  even  through  our  tears,  admired  that  disci- 
pline which  sometimes  prepares  the  young  to  die ; 
which,  by  sharp  trials  of  anguish,  and  long  days 
of  weariness,  weans  them  from  that  keen  sense  of 
mortal  enjoyment  which  is  so  naturally  theirs; 
which,  through  the  attenuation  of  the  body,  illu- 
minates the  soul,  and,  as  it  steals  the  bloom  from 
the  cheek,  kindles  the  lustre  of  faith  in  the  eye, 
and  makes  even  that  young  spirit  look,  unfalter- 
ing, across  the  dark  river,  and,  putting  aside  its 
earthly  loves  and  its  reasonable  expectations,  ex- 
claim, "  Now  I  am  ready !  "  But  it  would 
appear  that  equal  preparation,  though  in  different 
forms,  is  provided  for  most  of  us,  in  the  various 
experiences  of  sorrow  which  we  are  called  upon  to 
know,  and  which,  if  we  would   but  heed   them. 


CHRISTIAN    VIEW    OF    SORROW.  113 

have  a  celestial  mission,  seeking  to  draw  us  up 
from  this  lower  state,  to  induce  us  to  lay  up  our 
treasure  where  neither  moth  nor  rust  corrupts. 
And  in  the  Christian  view  of  man  as  an  heir  of 
the  spiritual  word,  does  not  sorrow,  in  this  its 
weaning  tendency,  receive  a  most  beautiful  expla- 
nation ? 

And,  because  it  accomplishes  this  work,  may  be 
the  reason  why  sorrow  always  wears  a  kind  of 
supernatural  character.  It  is  true  that  blessings, 
equally  with  afflictions,  come  from  Heaven;  but 
this  truth  is  not  so  generally  felt.  A  sharp  dis- 
appointment will  suddenly  drive  us  to  God.  The 
mariner  of  life  sails,  unthinking,  over  its  prosper- 
ous seas,  but  a  flaw  of  storm  will  bring  him  to  his 
prayers.  And  religion,  reason  as  we  will,  is  pecu- 
liarly associated  with  affliction.  And  does  not 
sorrow  possess  this  supernatural  air,  not  merely 
because  it  interrupts  the  usual  order  of  things,  but 
because,  more  than  joy,  it  has  a  weaning  and 
spiritual    tendency,  —  is   sent,   as   it  were,   more 


114  CHRISTIAN    VIEW    OF    SORROW. 

directly  from  God  for  this  specific  purpose  ?  At 
least,  after  the  sanctifying  experience  of  sorrow, 
we  hold  our  joys  more  religiously. 

There  are  other  tendencies  of  sorrow  akin  to 
this,  upon  which  I  might  dwell,  and  which  show 
the  explanation  that  it  receives  in  the  Christian 
light.  The  humbling  effect  that  it  has  upon  the 
proud  and  hard-hearted;  the  equalizing  result 
which  it  works,  making  the  rich  and  poor,  the 
obscure  and  the  great,  stand  upon  the  level  of  the 
common  humanity,  —  the  common  liability  and 
dependence.  I  might,  expanding  the  topic  already 
touched  upon,  speak  of  the  influence  which  sorrow 
sheds  abroad,  chastening  the  light,  attempering 
the  draught  of  joy,  and  thus  keeping  our  hearts 
better  balanced  than  otherwise.  But  I  have  suf- 
ficiently illustrated  its  mission.  I  have  shown  its 
use,  even  its  beauty,  in  the  Christian  view.  I 
have  shown  why  Christianity,  as  the  universal 
religion,  is  rightly  styled  the  "religion  of  sorrow," 
and  why  Christ,  as  the  perfect  teacher  and  ex- 


CHRISTIAN    VIEW    OF    SORROW.  115 

ample,  was  "  a  man  of  sorrows,  and   acquainted 
with  grief." 

Let  us  all,  then,  recognize  the  fact  that  life 
itself  is  a  discipline.  That  for  each  of  us  sorrow  is 
mingled  with  joy  in  order  that  this  discipline  may 
be  accomplished.  No  one  reaches  the  noon  of  life 
without  some  grief,  some  disappointment,  some 
sharp  trial,  which  assures  him,  if  he  will  but  heed 
it,  that  life  is  already  declining,  and  that  his  spirit 
should  train  itself  for  a  higher  and  more  permanent 
state.  In  the  failure  of  mortal  excellence  let  him 
recognize  the  proof  of  an  immortal  good,  and  from 
the  bitterness  that  mingles  with  these  earthly 
waters,  turn  to  drink  of  the  celestial  fountain.  Of 
all  things,  let  us  not  receive  sorrow  indifferently, 
or  without  reflection.  Its  mission  is  for  discipline, 
but  we  feel  it  to  be  discipline  only  by  recognizing 
its  source  and  its  meaning;  "it  yieldeth  the 
peaceable  fruits  of  righteousness  "  only  "  to  them 
that  are  exercised  thereby."  Otherwise,  it  may 
come  and  go  as  the  storm  that  rends  the  oak,  or 


116  CHRISTIAN    VIEW    OF    SORROW. 

the  drenching  tempest  that  glides  off  as  it  falls. 
It  may  startle  us  for  a  moment,  —  it  may  hurt  us 
with  a  sense  of  pain  and  loss,  —  it  may  awe  us 
with  its  mystery ;  hut  unless  it  rouses  us  to  solemn 
thought  upon  the  meaning  of  life,  to  self-com- 
munion and  prayer,  to  higher  and  holier  action,  it 
availeth  little.  It  should  not  smite  the  heart's 
chords  to  wring  from  them  a  mere  shriek  of 
distress,  but  to  inspire  it  with  a  deeper  and  more 
elefvated  tone,  and  by  the  element  of  sadness  which 
it  infuses  make  a  more  liquid  and  exquisite 
melody. 

But  while  we  are  thus  taught  to  chasten  our 
views  of  life,  and  to  hold  even  our  joys  with  seri- 
ousness, and  with  wise  forethought,  let  us  not 
look  upon  things  with  any  morbid  vision,  or  cast 
over  them  a  monotonous  hue.  Let  us  not  live  in 
gloom  and  bitterness.  The  Christian,  of  all 
others,  is  the  best  fitted  for  a  cheerful  and  proper 
enjoyment  of  life,  because  he  wisely  recognizes 
the  use  of  things,   understands  their   evanescent 


CHRISTIAN    VIEW    OF   SORROW.  117 

nature,  and  sees  the  infinite  goodness  that  has 
so  ordained  it.  He  is  not  surprised  by  sudde?i 
terrors.  He  is  prepared  for  sorrow,  and  thus  can 
rest  in  peace  with  the  good  that  he  has;  while 
those  who  bury  heart  and  soul  in  the  present 
enjoyment,  and  know  nothing  but  sensual  good, 
are  broken  down  by  calamity.  The  sudden 
change,  like  a  thunder-gust,  puts  out  their  light, 
and  darkens  all  their  life ;  and  it  is  they  who  are 
apt  to  fall  from  the  summit  of  delight  into  a  mor- 
bid gloom ;  while  the  Christian,  with  his  balanced 
soul,  inhabits  neither  extreme. 

Finally,  let  us  remember  that  it  is  not  the 
object  of  sorrow  to  overcome,  but  to  elevate; 
not  to  conquer  us,  but  that  we,  by  it,  should 
conquer.  It  converts  the  thorns  that  wound  us 
into  a  crown.  It  makes  us  strong  by  the  baptism 
of  tears.  The  saint  is  always  a  hero.  This  ex- 
plains that  grand  distinction  between  Heathen  and 
Christian  art,  of  which  I  spoke  in  the  commence- 
ment;   that    expression   of    power   blended   with 


118  CHRISTIAN   VIEW    OF    SORROW. 

agony,  —  of  celestial  beatitude  refining  itself  upon 
the  face  of  grief.  Christianity  has  made  martyr- 
dom sublime,  and  sorrow  triumphant.  Christ  is 
"the  Captain  of  our  salvation," — the  leader  of 
"many  sons  unto  glory;"  for  he  was  "a  man  of 
sorrows,  and  acquainted  with  grief" 


christian  Cons0latioii  in  Jcndiness* 


Aud  yet  I  am  not  alone,  because  the  Father  is  with  me.    Jons  xvi.  32. 


*HESE  words  are  found  in  the  farewell 
address  of  Jesus  to  his  disciples.  They 
were  uttered  in  the  dark  hour  of  coming  agony, 
and  in  the  face  of  an  ignominious  death.  Because 
Christ  was  divinely  empowered,  and  possessed  the 
spirit  without  measure,  let  us  not  suppose  that  to 
him  there  was  no  pain  or  sorrow,  in  that  great 
crisis.  With  all  his  supernatural  dignity,  he  ap- 
pears to  us  far  more  attractive  when  we  consider 
him  as  impressible  by  circumstances, — as  moved 
by  human  sympathies.  He  is  thus  not  merely  a 
teacher,  but  a  pattern  for  us.  In  all  our  trials 
he  not  only  enables  us  to  endure  and  to  triumph, 


122  CONSOLATION    IN   LONELINESS. 

but  draws  us  close  to  himself  by  the  aflBnity  of  his 
own  experience.  We  see,  too,  how  the  best  men, 
men  of  the  clearest  faith,  may  still  look  upon 
death  with  a  shudder,  and  shrink  from  the  dark 
and  narrow  valley ;  not  because  they  fear  death, 
as  such,  but  because  of  the  agony  of  dissolution, 
the  rupture  of  all  familiar  ties,  and  the  solemn 
mystery  of  the  last  change. 

But  death  and  suffering,  as  Jesus  was  now  to 
meet  them,  appeared  in  no  ordinary  forms.  He 
was  to  bear  affliction  with  no  friendly  consolations 
around  him ;  but  alone  !  —  alone  in  the  wrestling 
of  the  garden,  and  amid  the  cruel  mockery.  Not 
upon  the  peaceful  death-bed,  but  upon  the  bare 
and  rugged  cross,  torn  by  nails,  pierced  with  the 
spear,  crowned  with  thorns,  taunted  by  the  revil- 
ings  of  the  multitude,  the  vinegar  and  the  gall. 
He  must  be  deserted,  and  encounter  these  trials 
alone.  He  must  be  rejected,  betrayed,  cruci- 
fied alone.  And  as  he  spoke  to  his  disciples  those 
words  of  affection  and  holiness  —  those  words  so 


i 


CONSOLATION    IN    LONELINESS.  123 

full  of  counsel  and  sublime  consolation  —  he  re- 
membered all  this ;  he  remembered  that  thej  who 
now  clung  to  him,  and  listened  in  sorrow  to  his 
parting  accents,  would  soon  be  scattered  as  sheep 
without  a  shepherd,  and  leave  him  to  himself  in 
all  that  shame  and  agony.  But  even  as  he  fore- 
told it  there  gleamed  upon  his  spirit  the  sunshine 
of  an  inner  consciousness,  —  a  comfort  that  no 
cloud  could  darken ;  and  instantly  he  added, 
'•  And  yet  I  am  not  alone,  because  the  Father  is 
with  me." 

Having  thus  considered  the  circumstances  in 
which  these  words  were  spoken,  I  now  proceed  to 
draw  from  them  a  few  reflections. 

I  would  say,  then,  in  the  first  place,  that  the 
great  test  which  proves  the  excellence  of  the 
religion  of  Christ  is  its  adaptation  to  man  in  soli- 
tude, —  to  man  as  a  solitary  being ;  because  it  is 
then  that  he  is  thrown  upon  the  resources  of  his 
own  soul,  —  upon  his  inner  and  everlasting  life. 
In  society  he  finds  innumerable  objects  to  attract 


124  CONSOLATION    IN    LONELINESS. 

his  attention,  and  to  absorb  his  affections.  The 
ordinary  cares  of  every  day,  the  pursuit  of  his 
favorite  scheme,  the  converse  of  friends,  the  excit- 
ing topics  of  the  season,  the  hours  of  recreation, 
all  fill  up  his  time,  and  occupy  his  mind  with 
matters  external  to  himself  And  looking  upon 
him  merely  in  these  relations,  if  we  could  forget 
its  great  social  bearings,  and  the  harmonies  which 
flow  from  its  all-pervading  spirit  out  into  every 
condition  of  life,  we  might,  perhaps,  say  that  man 
could  get  along  well  enough  without  religion.  If 
this  world  were  made  up  merely  of  business  and 
pleasure,  perhaps  the  atheist's  theory  would  suf- 
fice, and  we  might  feel  indifferent  whether  con- 
trolled by  plastic  matter  or  intelligent  mind.  We 
will  admit  that  happiness,  in  one  sense  of  the 
term,  does  not "  essentially  depend  upon  religion. 
Nay,  we  must  admit  this  proposition.  A  man 
may  be  happy  without  being  religious.  Good 
health,  good  spirits ;  —  how  many,  possessing 
these,  really  enjoy  life,  without  being  devout,  or 


CONSOLATION   IN   LONELINESS.  125 

religious,  according  to  any  legitimate  meaning  of 
that  term. 

But  change  the  order  of  circumstances.  Re- 
move these  external  helps,  —  substitute  therefor 
sorrow,  duty,  the  revelations  of  our  own  inner 
being,  —  and  all  this  gayety  vanishes  like  the 
sparkles  from  a  stream  when  the  storm  comes  up. 
The  soul  that  has  depended  upon  outward  con- 
genialities for  its  happiness  has  no  permanent 
principle  of  happiness ;  for  that  is  the  distinction 
which  religion  bestows.  He  who  cannot  retire 
within  himself,  and  find  his  best  resources  there, 
is  fitted,  perhaps,  for  the  smoother  passages  of 
life,  but  poorly  prepared  for  all  life.  He  who 
cannot  and  dare  not  turn  away  from  these  outward 
engrossments,  and  be  in  spiritual  solitude,  —  who 
is  afraid  or  sickens  at  the  idea  of  being  alone,  — 
has  a  brittle  possession  in  all  that  happiness  which 
comes  from  the  whirl  and  surface  of  things.  One 
hour  may  scatter  it  forever.  And  poorly,  I  re- 
peat, is  he  prepared   for  all  life,  —  for  some  of 


126  CONSOLATION   IN    LONELINESS. 

the  most  serious  and  important  moments  of  life. 
These,  as  I  shall  proceed  to  show,  we  must  meet 
alone,  and  from  within;  and,  therefore,  it  consti- 
tutes the  blessedness  of  the  Christian  religion  that 
it  enables  man  when  in  solitude  to  have  com- 
munion, consolation,  and  guidance.  In  fact,  it 
makes  him,  when  alone,  to  be  not  alone,  —  to  say, 
with  glad  consciousness,  "I  am  not  alone,  because 
the  Father  is  with  me." 

To  illustrate  this  truth,  then,  I  say,  that  so  far 
as  the  communion  and  help  of  this  outward  world 
and  of  human  society  are  concerned,  there  are 
many  and  important  seasons  when  man  must  be 
alone.  In  the  first  place,  in  his  most  interior  and 
essential  nature,  man  is  a  solitary  being.  He  is 
an  individual,  a  unit,  amid  all  the  souls  aroimd 
him,  and  all  other  things,  —  a  being  distinct  and 
peculiar  as  a  star.  God,  in  all  the  variety  of  his 
works,  has  made  no  man  exactly  like  another. 
There  is  an  individual  isolation,  a  conscious  per- 
sonality, which  he  can  share  with  no  other ;  which 


CONSOLATION    IN    LONELINESS.  127 

resists  the  idea  of  absorption;  whicli  claims  its 
own  distinct  immortality;  which  has  its  own 
wants  and  woes,  its  own  sense  of  duty,  its  own 
spiritual  experiences.  Christianity  insists  upon 
nothing  more  strongly  than  this.  Piercing  below 
iill  conventionalisms,  it  recognizes  man  as  an  indi- 
vidual soul,  and,  as  such,  addresses  him  with  its 
truths  and  its  sanctions.  Indeed,  it  bases  its 
grand  doctrine  of  human  brotherhood  and  equality 
upon  the  essential  individuality  of  each  man,  be- 
cause each  represents  all,  —  each  has  in  himself 
the  nature  of  every  other.  It  demands  individual 
repentance,  individual  holiness,  individual  faith. 
One  cannot  believe  for  another.  One  cannot  de- 
cide questions  of  conscience  for  another.  One 
cannot  bear   the   sins   or  appropriate  the  virtues 

I  of  another.  It  is  true,  we  have  relations  to  the 
great  whole,  to  the  world  of  mankind,  and  to  the 
material  universe.  We  are  linked  to  these  by 
subtle  affinities.  We  are  interwoven  with  them 
all,  —  bound  up  with  them  in  arterial  unity  and 


128  CONSOLATION    IN   LONELINESS. 

life.  They  have  all  poured  their  results  into  our 
Bouls,  and  helped  to  form  us,  and  do  now  support 
us ;  and  we,  in  like  manner,  react  upon  them,  and 
upon  others.  This  truth  is  a  vital  one,  not  to  be 
neglected.  But  a  deeper  truth  than  this,  and  one 
upon  which  this  depends,  is  the  individual  peculi- 
arity of  each,  —  his  integral  distinctness,  without 
which  there  would  be  no  such  thing  as  union,  or 
relationship ;  nothing  but  monotony  and  inertia. 

The  great  fact,  then,  which  I  would  impress 
upon  you  is,  that,  essetitially,  as  spiritual  beings, 
we  are  alone.  And  I  remark  that  there  are  ex- 
periences in  life  when  we  are  made  to  feel  this 
deep  fact ;  when  each  must  deal  with  his  reason, 
his  heart,  his  conscience,  for  himself;  when  each 
is  to  act  as  if  sole-existent  in  the  universe,  realiz- 
ing that  he  is  a  spirit  breathed  from  God,  com- 
plete in  himself,  subject  to  all  spiritual  laws,  inter- 
ested in  all  spiritual  welfare ;  when  no  stranger 
soul,  though  it  be  that  of  his  dearest  friend,  can 
intermeddle  with  all  that  occupies  him,  or  share  it. 


CONSOLATION   IN   LONELINESS.  129 

Such  experiences  we  have  when  reflection  binds 
us  to  the  past.  Memorj  then  opens  for  us  a  vol- 
ume that  no  eye  but  God's  and  ours  can  read ;  — 
memories  of  neglect,  of  sin,  of  deep  secrets  that 
our  hearts  have  hidden  in  their  innermost  folds. 
Such  experiences  sometimes  there  are  when  we 
muse  upon  the  external  universe ;  when  we  reflect 
upon  the  vastness  of  creation,  the  littleness  of 
human  effort,  the  transciency  of  human  relations ; 
when  our  souls  are  drawn  away  from  all  ordinary 
communions,  and  we  feel  that  we  are  drifting  be- 
fore an  almighty  will,  bound  to  an  inevitable  des- 
tiny, hemmed  in  by  irresistible  forces.  Then, 
with  every  tie  of  association  shrinking  from  us ; 
then,  keeping  the  solitary  vigil ;  then,  with  cold, 
vast  nature  all  around  us,  we  are  alone.  Or, 
there  is  a  solitude  which  oppresses  us  even  in  the 
heart  of  the  great  city ;  —  a  solitude  more  intense 
even  than  that  of  naked  nature;  when  all  faces 
are  strange  to  us;  when  no  pulse  of  sympathy 
throbs  from    our  heart  to  the  hearts  of  others; 


130  CONSOLATION   IN   LONELINESS. 

when  each  passes  us  by,  engaged  with  his  own 
destiny,  and  leaving  us  to  fulfil  ours.  In  this 
tantalizing  solitude  of  the  crowd,  in  this  sense  of 
isolation  from  our  fellows,  if  never  before,  do  we 
feel,  with  sickness  of  heart,  that  we  are  alone. 
There  is  the  solitude  of  sickness,  —  the  solitude  of 
the  watcher  or  of  the  patient,  —  a  solitude  to 
which,  at  times,  duty  and  Providence  call  us  all. 
There  are,  in  brief,  countless  circumstances  of  life 
when  we  shall  realize  that  we  are  indeed  alone ; 
and  sad  enough  will  be  that  solitude  if  we  have 
no  inner  resource,  —  no  Celestial  companionship  ; 
—  if  we  cannot  say,  and  feel  as  we  say  it,  that  we 
are  not  alone,  for  the  Father  is  with  us. 

But,  while  I  cannot  specify  all  these  forms  of 
solitude,  let  me  dwell  upon  two  or  three  of  the 
experiences  of  life  in  which  we  are  peculiarly 
alone. 

First,  then,  I  would  say,  that  we  must  be  alone 
in  the  pursuit  of  Truth  and  the  work  of  Duty. 
Others  may  aid  me  in  these,  but  I  must  decide 


CONSOLATION   IN    LONELINESS.  131 

and  act  for  myself.  I  must  believe  for  myself. 
I  must  do  right  for  myself;  or  if  I  do  wrong,  it 
is  also  for  myself,  and  in  myself  I  realize  the  ret- 
ribution.    By  my  own  sense  of  right  and  wrong 

—  by  my  own  standard  of  truth  and  falsehood  — 
I  must  stand  or  fall.  There  is  in  this  world 
nothing  so  great  and  solemn  as  the  struggles  of 
the  solitary  soul  in  its  researches  after  the  truth, 

—  in  its  endeavors  to  obey  the  right.  We  may 
be  indifferent  to  these  vital  questions,  —  it  is  to  be 
feared  that  many  are ;  we  may  glide  along  in  the 
suppleness  of  habit,  and  the  ease  of  conventional- 
ism; we  may  never  trouble  ourselves  with  any 
pungent  scruples ;  we  may  never  pursue  the  task 
of  introspection,  or  bring  to  bear  upon  the  fibres 
of  motive  and  desire  within  us  the  intense  focus  of 
God's  moral  law;  we  may  never  vex  our  souls 
with  tests  of  faith,  but  rest  contented  with  the 
common  or  hereditary  standard ;  —  but  he  who 
will  be  serious  in  the  work  of  spiritual  discipline, 
who  will  act  from  a  vital  law  of  duty,  must  endure 


132  CONSOLATION   IN   LONELINESS. 

struggles  and  conflicts  than  which,  I  repeat,  there 
is  nothing  more  solemn  under  the  sun.  He  will 
often  find  himself  opposed  to  the  general  current 
of  human  faith  and  action.  His  position  will  be 
singular.  His  principle  will  be  tried.  Interest 
will  direct  him  another  way ;  his  strictness  will  be 
ridiculed,  his  motives  questioned,  his  sincerity 
misunderstood  and  aspersed.  Alone  must  he  en- 
dure all  this,  —  alone  cling  to  the  majestic  ideal 
of  right  as  it  rises  to  his  own  soul.  And  thus  he 
must  wage  a  bitter  conflict  with  fear  and  with 
seduction,  —  with  sophistries  of  the  heart,  and  re- 
luctance of  the  will. 

Often,  too,  must  he  question  his  own  motives 
with  a  severer  judgment  than  that  of  the  world, 
as  his  scrutiny  is  more  close,  and  his  self-knowl- 
edge more  minute.  He  knows  the  secret  sin,  the 
mental  act,  the  spiritual  aberration.  He  knows 
the  distance  between  his  highest  effort  and  that 
lofty  standard  of  perfection  to  which  he  has 
pledged  his  purposes.      Alone,   alone    does    the 


CONSOLATION   IN   LONELINESS.  133 

great  conflict  go  on  within  him.  The  struggle, 
the  self-denial,  the  pain,  and  the  victory,  are  of 
the  very  essence  of  martyrdom,  —  are  the  chief 
peculiarities  in  the  martyr's  lot.  His,  too,  must 
be  the  solitude  of  prayer,  when,  throwing  by  all 
entanglements,  —  in  his  naked  individuality,  — 
he  wrestles  at  the  Mercy  Seat,  or  soars  to  the 
bliss  of  Divine  communion.  In  such  hours,  —  in 
every  hour  of  self-communion,  —  when  we  ask 
ourselves  the  highest  questions  respecting  faith 
and  duty,  it  is  the  deepest  comfort  to  the  religious 
soul  to  feel  and  to  say,  "  I  am  not  alone,  for  the 
Father  is  with  me." 

Again;  there  are  experiences  of  Sorrow  in 
which  we  are  peculiarly  alone.  How  often  does 
the  soul  feel  this  when  it  is  suffering  from  the 
loss  of  friends  !  Then  we  find  no  comfort  in  ex- 
ternal things.  Pleasure  charms  not ;  business 
cannot  cheat  us  of  our  grief;  wealth  supplies  not 
the  void ;  and  though  the  voice  of  friendship  falls 
in  consolation  upon  the  ear,  yet,  with  all  these,  we 


134  CONSOLATION   IN   LONELINESS. 

are  alone,  —  alone !  No  other  spirit  can  fully 
comprehend  our  woe,  or  enter  into  our  desolation. 
No  human  eye  can  pierce  to  our  sorrows ;  no  sym- 
pathy can  share  them.  Alone  we  must  realize 
their  sharp  suggestions,  their  painful  memories, 
their  brood  of  sad  and  solemn  thoughts.  The 
mother  bending  over  her  dead  child ;  —  0  !  what 
solitude  is  like  that  ?  —  where  such  absolute  lone- 
liness as  that  which  possesses  her  soul,  when  she 
takes  the  final  look  of  that  little  pale  face  crowned 
with  flowers  and  sleeping  in  its  last  chamber,  with 
the  silent  voice  of  the  dead  uttering  its  last  good 
night?  What  more  solitary  than  the  spirit  of 
one  who,  like  the  widow  of  Nain,  follows  to  the 
grave  her  only  son  ?  —  of  one  from  whom  the 
wife,  the  mother,  has  been  taken  ?  The  mourner 
is  in  solitude,  —  alone,  in  this  peopled  world ;  — 
0,  how  utterly  alone  !  Through  the  silent  valley 
of  tears  wanders  that  stricken  spirit,  seeing  only 
memorials  of  its  loss. 

Indeed,    sorrow   of  any  kind   is   solitary.     Its 


CONSOLATION   IN    LONELINESS.  135 

deepest  pangs,  its  most  solemn  visitations,  are  in 
the  secrecy  of  the  individual  soul.  We  labor  to 
conceal  it  from  others.  We  wear  a  face  of  uncon- 
cern or  gayety  amid  the  multitude.  Society  is 
thronged  with  masked  faces.  Unseen  burdens  of 
woe  are  carried  about  in  its  busy  haunts.  The 
man  of  firm  step  in  the  mart,  and  of  vigorous  arm 
in  the  workshop,  has  communions  in  his  chamber 
that  make  him  weak  as  a  child.  Nothing  is  more 
deceitful  than  a  happy  countenance.  Haggard 
spirits  laugh  over  the  wine-cup,  and  the  blooming 
garland  of  pleasure  crowns  au  aching  head.  For 
sorrow  is  secret  and  solitary.  Each  "  heart  know- 
eth  its  own  bitterness." 

How  precious,  then,  in  the  loneliness  of  sorrow, 
is  that  faith  which  bids  us  look  up  and  see  how 
near  is  God,  and  feel  what  divine  companionship 
is  ours,  and  know  what  infinite  sympathy  engirds 
us,  —  what  concern  for  our  good  is,  even  in  this 
darkness,  shaping  out  blessings  for  us,  and  distil- 
ling from  this  secret  agony  everlasting  peace  for 


136  CONSOLATION   IN    LONELINESS. 

the  soul.  How  precious  that  faith  in  the  clear 
vision  of  which  we  can  saj,  "I  am  not  alone,  for 
the  Father  is  with  me." 

Finally,  we  must  experience  Death  alone.  As  I 
said  in  the  commencement,  the  best,  the  most  pious 
soul,  may  naturally  shrink  from  this  great  event. 
We  may  learn  to  anticipate  it  with  resignation,  to 
look  upon  it  with  trust ;  but  indifference  respect- 
ing it  is  no  proof  of  religion.  It  would  be,  rather, 
a  bad  sign  for  one  to  approach  it  without  emotion ; 
for  however  his  faith  may  penetrate  beyond,  the 
religious  spirit  will,  with  deep  awe,  lift  that 
curtain  of  mystery  which  hangs  before  the  untried 
future.  That  is  a  fact  which  we  must  encounter 
alone.  Friends  may  gather  around  us;  their 
ministrations  may  aid,  their  consolations  soothe  us. 
They  may  be  with  us  to  the  very  last ;  they  may 
cling  to  us  as  though  they  would  pluck  us  back  to 
the  shores  of  time ;  their  voices  may  fall,  the  last 
of  earthly  sounds,  upon  our  ears ;  their  kiss 
awaken  the  last  throb  of  consciousness ;  but  they 


CONSOLATION   IN   LONELINESS.  137 

cannot  go  with  us,  they  cannot  die  in  our  stead ; 
the  last  time  must  come,  —  they  must  loosen  their 
hold  from  us,  and  fade  from  our  vision,  and  we 
become  wrapt  in  the  solemn  experience  of  death, 
alone  !  Alone  must  we  tread  the  dark  valley,  — 
alone  embark  for  the  unseen  land.  No,  Christian ! 
jwt  alone.  To  your  soul,  thus  separated  in  blank 
amazement  from  all  familiar  things,  still  is  that 
vision  of  faith  granted  that  so  often  lighted  your 
earthly  perplexities;  to  you  is  it  given,  in  this 
most  solitary  hour,  to  say,  "  I  am  not  alone,  for 
the  Father  is  with  me  !  " 

I  repeat,  then,  in  closing,  that  the  test  which 
proves  the  excellence  of  the  religion  of  Christ  is 
the  fact  that  it  fits  us  for  those  solemn  hours  of 
life  when  we  must  be  alone.  Mere  happiness  we 
may  derive  from  other  sources ;  but  this  consola- 
tion not  all  the  world  can  give,  —  the  world  cannot 
take  it  away. 

Let  us  remember,  then,  that  though  we  seldom 
look  within  —  though   our   affections  may  be  ab- 


138  CONSOLATION    IN   LONELINESS. 

sorbed  in  external  things  —  these  solitary  seasons 
will  come.  It  behoves  us,  therefore,  as  we  value 
true  peace  of  mind,  genuine  happiness,  which  con- 
nects us  to  the  throne  of  God  with  golden  links  of 
prayer,  —  it  behoves  each  to  ask  himself,  "Dare 
I  be  alone?  Am  I  ready  to  be  alone?  And  what 
report  will  my  soul  make  in  that  hour  of  solitude  ? 
K I  do  wrong,  if  I  cleave  to  the  evil  rather  than 
the  good,  what  shall  I  do  when  I  am  alone,  and 
yet  not  alone,  but  with  the  Father  ?  But  if  I  do 
right,  if  I  trust  in  Him,  and  daily  walk  with  Him, 
what  crown  of  human  honor,  what  store  of  wealth, 
what  residuum  of  earthly  pleasure,  can  compare 
with  the  glad  consciousness  that  wherever  I  rest  or 
wander,  in  every  season  and  circumstance,  in  the 
solitary  hours  of  life,  and  the  loneliness  of  death, 
God  is  verily  with  me  ? 

Surely,  no  attainment  is  equal  to  that  strength 
of  Christ,  by  which,  when  approaching  the  cross, 
he  was  able  to  say,  "I  am  not  alone,  for  the 
Father  is   with   me."     By  this  strength,  he  was 


CONSOLATION    IN    LONELINESS.  139 

able  to  do  more  than  to  say  and  feel  thus.  He 
was  able  to  strengthen  others,  —  to  exclaim,  "  Be 
of  good  cheer,  I  have  overcome  the  world."  So 
we,  by  spiritual  discipline,  having  learned  of  Christ 
to  be  thus  strong,  not  only  possess  a  spring  of  un- 
failing consolation  for  ourselves,  but  there  shall  go 
out  from  us  a  benediction  and  a  power  that  shall 
gladden  the  weary  and  fortify  the  weak,  —  that 
shall  fill  the  solitude  of  many  a  lonely  spirit  with 
the  consolations  of  the  Father's  love,  and  the  bliss 
of  the  Father's  presence. 


Iltsignation. 


The  cup  which  my  Father  hath  giren  me,  shall  I  not  drink  it  i    Jobs 
xviii.  11. 


*HE  circumstances  in  which  these  words 
were  uttered  have,  doubtless,  often  arrested* 
your  attention,  — '■  have  often  been  delineated  for 
you  by  others.  Yet  it  is  always  profitable  for  us 
to  recur  to  them  They  transpired  immediately 
after  our  Saviour's  farewell  with  his  disciples. 
The  entire  transaction  in  that  ''  upper  room  "  had 
been  hallowed  and  softened  by  the  fact  of  his 
coming  death.  He  saw  that  fact  distinctly  before 
him,  and  to  his  eye  everything  was  associated  with 
it.  As  he  took  the  bread  and  broke  it,  it  seemed 
to  him  an  emblem  of  himself,  pierced  and  dying; 
and  from  the  fulness  of  his  spirit  he  spoke,  "  Take, 


144  RESIGNATION. 

eat,  this  is  my  body,  broken  for  you."  As  he  took 
the  cup  and  set  it  before  them,  it  reminded  him  of 
his  blood,  that  must  flow  ere  his  mission  was 
fulfilled,  and  he  could  say,  "  It  is  finished."  And 
then,  when  the  traitor  rose  from  that  table  to  go 
out  and  consummate  the  very  purpose  that  should 
lead  to  that  event,  as  one  who  had  arrayed  himself 
in  robes  of  death,  and  was  about  to  declare  his 
legacy,  he  broke  forth  in  that  subline  strain  com- 
mencing, "  Now  is  the  Son  of  man  glorified,  and 
God  is  glorified  in  him;"  —  that  strain  of  min- 
gled precept,  and  promise,  and  warning,  and 
prayer,  from  which  the  weary  and  the  sick-hearted 
of  all  ages  shall  gather  strength  and  consolation, 
and  which  shall  be  read  in  dying  chambers  and 
houses  of  mourning  until  death  and  sorrow  shall 
reign  no  more. 

Laden,  then,  with  the  thought  of  his  death,  he 
had  gone  with  his  disciples  into  the  garden  of 
Gethsemane.  There,  in  the  darkness  and  loneli- 
ness  of  night,  the   full  anguish   of  his  situation 


RESIGNATION.  145 

rushed  upon  his  spirit.  He  shrank  from  the  rude 
scenes  that  opened  before  him, — from  the  mocker's 
sneer  and  the  ruler's  scourge ;  from  the  glare  of 
impatient  revenge,  and  the  weeping  eyes  of  helpless 
friendship ;  from  the  insignia  of  imposture  and  of 
shame ;  and  from  the  protracted,  thirsty,  torturing 
death.  He  shrank  from  these,  —  he  shrank  from 
the  rupture  of  tender  ties,  —  he  shrank  from  the 
parting  with  deeply-loved  friends,  —  his  soul  was 
overburdened,  his  spirit  was  swollen  to  agony,  and 
he  rushed  to  his  knees,  and  prayed,  "  Father,  if 
thou  be  willing,  remove  this  cup  from  me."  Yet 
even  then,  in  the  intensity  of  his  grief,  the  senti- 
ment that  lay  deep  and  serene  below  suggested  the 
conditions,  and  he  added,  "  Nevertheless,  not  my 
will,  but  thine,  be  done."  But  still  the  painful 
thought  oppressed  him,  and,  though  more  subdued 
now,  he  knelt  and  prayed  again,  "  0,  my  Father, 
if  this  cup  may  not  pass  away  from  me  except  I 
drink  it,  thy  will  be  done."  And  once  more,  as 
he  returned  from  his  weary,  sleeping  disciples, 
10 


146  RESIGNATION. 

and  found  himself  alone,  the  wish  broke  forth 
—  yet  tempered  by  the  same  obedient  com- 
pliance. 

And  here  I  pause  to  ask,  if,  in  all  that  scene  of 
agony,  anything  is  developed  inconsistent  with  the 
character  of  Christ?  K  we  would  have  it  other- 
wise? If  these  tears  and  groans  of  anguish  are 
tokens  of  a  weakness  that  we  would  conceal  from 
our  convictions,  —  that  we  would  overlook,  as 
marring  the  dignity  and  the  divinity  of  the  Sav- 
iour? For  one,  I  would  not  have  it  otherwise. 
I  would  not  have  the  consoling  strength,  the 
sympathizing  tenderness,  the  holy  victory  that 
may  be  drawn  from  thence,  —  I  would  not  have 
these  left  out  from  the  Life  that  was  given  us  as  a 
pattern.  Jesus,  we  are  told,  "  was  made  perfect 
through  suffering."  This  struggle  took  place  that 
victory  might  be  won ;  —  this  discipline  of  sorrow 
fell  upon  him  that  perfection  and  beauty  might 
be  developed.  By  this  we  see  that  Christ's  was 
a  spirit  liable  to  trial,  —  impressible  by  suffering ; 


RESIGNATION.  147 

and  from  this  fact  does  the  victory  appear  greater 
and  more  real.  In  this  we  see  one  striving 
with  mail's  sorrow,  —  seeking,  like  man,  to  be 
delivered  from  pain  and  grief,  yet  rising  to  a 
calm  obedience,  —  a  lofty  resignation.  Had  Jesus 
passed  through  hfe  always  serene,  always  un- 
shrinking, we  should  not  have  seen  a  man,  but 
something  that  man  is  not,  something  that  man 
cannot  be  in  this  world ;  and  that  calm  question, 
"  The  cup  that  my  Father  hath  given  me,  shall  I 
not  drink  it?"  would  lose  its  force  and  significance. 
Otherwise,  why  should  not  Jesus  be  as  resigned 
then  as  before?  He  had  betrayed  no  sense  of 
suffering,  no  impressibility  by  pain;  why  should 
he  not  be  willing,  seeing  he  was  always  able  to 
meet  the  end  ?  But  0  !  when  the  resignation 
has  been  born  in  wrestling  and  in  prayer,  —  when 
that  deep,  holy  calmness  has  fallen  upon  a  soul 
that  has  been  tossed  by  sorrow,  and  that  has 
shrunk  from  death,  —  when  the  brow  has  come 
up  smooth  and  radiant  from  the  shadow  of  mourn- 


148  RESIGNATION. 

ing,  —  when  that  soul  is  ready  for  the  issue,  not 
because  it  has  always  felt  around  it  the  girdle  of 
Omnipotence,  but  because,  through  weakness  and 
suffering,  it  has  risen  and  worked  out  an  unfal- 
tering trust,  and  taken  hold  of  the  hand  of  God 
by  the  effort  of  faith,  —  then  it  is,  I  say,  that 
resignation  is  beautiful  and  holy,  —  then  do  we 
wonder  and  admire. 

So  was  it  with  Jesus.  A  little  while  ago  we 
saw  him  bowed  with  sorrow,  his  eyes  lifted  with 
tears  to  heaven.  We  saw  that  he  keenly  felt 
the  approaching  pain,  and  shame,  and  death.  A 
little  while  ago,  the  still  night  air  was  laden  with 
his  cry,  "  Father,  if  it  be  thy  will,  let  this  cup 
pass  from  me."  And  now,  as  one  who  is  strong 
and  ready,  he  says  calmly  to  Peter,  "  The  cup 
which  my  Father  hath  given  me,  shall  I  not 
drink  it?"  Truly,  a  battle  has  been  fought,  and 
a  victory  won,  here;  but  we  should  not  be  the 
better  for  it,  were  it  not  for  that  very  process 
of   suffering   in   which    that    battle   was   waged, 


RESIGNATION.  149 

and  from  which  that  victory  was  wrung.  Now, 
when  we  sorrow,  we  know  who  also  sorrowed; 
we  remember  whose  agony  the  still  heavens  looked 
upon  with  all  their  starry  eyes,  —  whose  tears 
moistened  the  bosom  of  the  bare  earth,  —  whose 
cry  of  anguish  pierced  the  gloom  of  night.  Now, 
too,  when  we  sorrow,  we  know  where  to  find  re- 
lief; we  learn  that  spirit  of  resignation,  and  un- 
der what  conditions  it  may  be  born.  Thank  God, 
then,  for  the  lesson  of  the  lonely  garden  and  the 
weeping  Christ  —  we,  too,  may  be  "made  per- 
fect through  suffering.-' 

Such,  then,  were  the  circumstances  that  illus- 
trate the  words  of  the  text.  Scarcely  had  Jesus 
risen  from  his  knees,  and  wakened  the  drowsy  dis- 
ciples, when  the  light  of  lanterns  flashed  upon  him, 
and  Judas  came  with  a  multitude  to  bear  him  to 
that  death  from  which,  but  now,  he  shrunk  with 
agony.  But  he  shrunk  no  more.  The  trial  was 
over,  —  the  darkness  had  vanished,  —  an  angel 
had  strengthened  him;    and  when  the  impetuous 


150  RESIGNATION. 

Peter  drew  his  sword  and  smote  off  the  servant's 
ear,  his  master  turned  to  him,  with  the  calm 
rebuke,  "  Put  up  thy  sword  into  his  sheath ;  the 
cup  which  my  Father  hath  given  me,  shall  I  not 
drink  it  ?  "  Yes,  cold  and  bitter  as  that  cup  was, 
pressed  now  to  his  very  lips,  he  had  learned  to 
drink  it;  God  had  given  him  strength,  and  no 
more  did  he  falter,  no  more  did  he  groan  —  save 
once,  for  a  moment,  when,  upon  the  cross,  droop- 
ing, and  racked  with  intense  pain,  he  cried  out, 
''My  God,  my  God,  why  hast  thou  forsaken  me?" 
But  that  passed  away  in  the  triumphant  ejacula- 
tion, "  It  is  finished  !  " 

Such  was  the  resignation  of  Jesus;  a  trait  in  his 
character  which,  like  all  the  rest,  is  not  only  to 
be  admired,  but  imitated;  —  not  an  abstract  vir- 
tue, manifested  by  a  being  so  perfect  and  so 
enshrined  in  the  sanctity  of  a  divine  nature  that 
we  cannot  approach  it,  and  in  our  mortal,  work- 
day trials  can  never  feel  it;  but  a  virtue  which 
should  be   throned   in   every  heart,  the   strength 


RESIGNATION.  151 

and  consolation  of  which  every  suffering  soul  may 
experience.  Nay,  if  there  is  one  virtue  which 
is  more  often  needed  than  any  other,  which  lies 
at  the  base  of  true  happiness,  and  than  which 
there  is  no  surer  seal  of  piety,  it  is  this  virtue  of 
resignation.  And  let  me  proceed  to  say,  that  by 
resignation  I  mean  not  cold  and  sullen  apathy,  or 
reckless  hardihood,  but  a  sweet  trust  and  humble 
acquiescence,  which  show  that  the  soul  has  submit- 
ted itself  to  the  Father  who  knows  and  does  best, 
and  that  it  meets  his  dispensations  with  obedience 
and  his  mysteries  with  faith.  The  apathy  and 
hardihood  to  which  I  have  alluded  are  very  far 
from  the  trust  and  piety  of  a  religious  spirit.  The 
fatalist  acquiesces  in  the  course  of  things  because 
he  cannot  help  it.  He  has  reasoned  to  the  con- 
clusion that  his  murmuring  and  weeping  will  not 
alter  matters,  arid  he  has  resolved  to  take  things 
as  they  come.  But  here  is  no  resignation  to  the 
will  of  God,  but  to  the  necessity  of  things.  Here 
is  no  faith  that  all  things  are  wisely  ordered,  and 


152  RESIGNATION. 

that  sorrow  is  but  the  shadow  of  the  Father's 
hand.  No ;  here  is  the  simple  belief  that  things 
are  as  they  are,  and  cannot  be  altered,  —  that  an 
arbitrary  law  is  the  eternal  rule,  not  a  benevolent 
and  holy  purpose ;  and  the  philosopher  Avould  be 
just  as  resigned  if  he  believed  all  things  to  be 
under  the  guidance  of  a  blind  fate,  whose  iron 
machinery  drives  on  to  level  or  exalt,  unintelligent 
and  remorseless,  whether  in  its  course  it  brings 
about  good  or  evil,  —  whether  it  gladdens  human 
hearts  or  crushes  them.  Such  resignation  as  this 
may  be  quite  common  in  the  world,  manifested  in 
various  phases,  and  by  men  of  different  religious 
opinions.  Do  we  not  often  hear  the  expression, 
"  Well,  things  are  as  they  are,  —  we  do  best  to 
take  them  as  they  come;"  and  here  the  matter 
ends  ?  No  higher  reference  is  made.  The  things 
alluded  to  may  issue  from  the  bosom  of  material 
nature,  may  be  sent  into  the  world  by  chance,  or 
may  come  from  the  good  Father  of  all;  but  the 
minds  of  these  reasoners  reach  not  so  far.     Now 


RESIGNATION.  153 

I  repeat,  there  is  no  religion  and  no  true  phi- 
losophy in  this  method;  certainly  it  is  not  such 
resignation  as  Jesus  manifested.  In  fact,  it  indi- 
cates total  carelessness  as  to  the  discipline  of  life, 
and  will  generally  be  found  with  men  in  whose 
thoughts  God  is  not,  or  to  whose  conceptions  he 
is  the  distant,  inactive  Deity,  not  the  near  and 
ever-working  Controller.  I  cannot  admire  the 
conduct  of  that  man  who  when  the  bolt  of  sorrow 
falls,  receives  it  upon  the  armor  of  a  rigid  fatalism, 
who  wipes  scarcely  a  tear  from  his  hard,  dry  face, 
and  says,  "  Well,  it  cannot  be  helped  ;  things  are 
so  ordered."  Below  all  this  there  is  often  a 
sulky,  half-angry  sentiment,  as  though  the  victim 
felt  the  blow,  but  was  determined  not  to  wince, 
—  as  though  there  was  an  acknowledgment  of 
weakness,  but  also  a  display  of  pride,  —  a  feel- 
ing that  we  cannot  resist  sorrow,  yet  that  sorrow 
has  no  business  to  come,  and  now  that  it  has 
come  the  sufferer  will  not  yield  to  it.  This, 
evidently,  is  not  resignation,  religious  resignation, 


154  RESIGNATION. 

but  only  sullen   acquiescence,  or   reckless  hardi- 
hood. 

In  a  certain  sense  it  is  true  that  we  do  well  to 
take  things  as  thej  come,  —  that  we  cannot  help 
the  eternal  laws  that  control  events.  But  we 
must  go  behind  this  truth.  Whence  do  events 
come,  and  for  what  purpose  do  they  come  ?  What 
is  life,  and  for  what  end  are  all  its  varied  dispensa- 
tions ?  Religion  points  us  up  beyond  the  cloud  of 
materialism,  and  behind  the  mechanism  of  nature, 
to  an  Infinite  Spirit,  to  a  God,  to  a  Father.  All 
things  are  moved  by  infinite  Love.  Life  is  not 
merely  a  phenomenon,  it  is  a  Lesson.  Its  events 
do  not  come  and  go,  in  a  causeless,  arbitrary  man- 
ner ;  they  are  meant  for  our  discipline  and  our 
good.  In  whatever  aspect  they  come,  then,  let 
their  appropriate  lesson  be  heeded.  This  is  the 
religious  view  of  life,  and  is  wide  apart  from  the 
philosophy  that  lets  events  happen  as  they  will, 
as  though  we  were  in  the  setting  of  a  heady  cur- 
rent, and  were  borne  along  among  other  matters 


RESIGNATION.  155 

that  now  help  us,  now  jar  and  wound  us,  —  that 
happen  without  order  and  without  object ;  all,  like 
ourselves,  driven  along  and  taking  things  as  they 
come.  In  the  religious  view,  all  things  stream 
from  God's  throne,  and  whatever  sky  hangs  over 
them,  the  infinite  One  is  present ;  prosperity  is  the 
sunshine  that  he  has  sent,  and  Faith,  as  she  weeps, 
beholds  a  bow  in  the  clouds. 

The  religious  man  takes  things  as  they  come, 
but  how  ?  In  a  reverent  and  filial  spirit,  a  spirit 
that  obeys  and  trusts  because  God  has  ordained. 
He  refers,  behind  the  event,  to  the  will  that 
declares  it.  And  yet,  this  will  be  no  formal, 
lifeless  resignation.  He  will  not  be  stripped  of 
his  manhood,  or  become  unnatural  in  his  religion. 
His  resignation  will  not  be  the  cold  assent  of 
reason,  or  the  mere  rote  and  repetition  of  the 
lips.  No,  it  will  be  born  in  struggling  and  iu 
sorrow.  Religion  is  not  a  process  that  makes  our 
nature  callous  to  all  fierce  heats  or  drenching 
storms.     Neither  is  he  the  most  religious  man  who 


156  RESIGNATION. 

is  calmest  iu  the  keen  crisis  of  trouble.  I  say 
in  the  crisis  of  trouble  —  for  to  human  vision 
there  always  is  a  crisis.  We  cannot  penetrate  to 
the  secret  determinations  of  God,  and  in  the  season 
of  care  and  affliction  there  is  a  time  when  the  issue 
is  uncertain,  —  when  we  cannot  saj  it  is  sealed. 
What  shall  we  do  then  ?  Is  human  agency 
nothing?  Grant  that  we  we  driving  down  a 
stream,  —  can  we  use  no  effort  ?  Is  there  not  a 
time  when  deeds,  struggles,  prayers,  are  of  some 
avail?  —  when  the  spirit,  in  its  intense  agony, 
with  swollen  strength  and  surging  tears,  heaves 
against  the  catastrophe,  if  yet,  perchance,  it  may 
ward  it  off?  Truely,  there  is  such  a  time,  and  the 
humblest  disciple  of  Christ  may  weep  as  he  also 
wept.  But  let  him  also  strive  as  Christ  strove. 
Let  him  not  dash  his  grief  in  rebellious  billows  to 
the  throne:  let  not  his  groans  arise  in  resentful 
murmurs  ;  let  the  remembrance  of  what  God  is  and 
why  he  does,  be  with  him,  and  let  the  filial,  rever- 
ent trust  steal  in,  — "  Not  my  will,  but  thine  be 


RESIGNATION.  157 

done."  That  reference  to  God,  that  obedience  to 
him,  rising  from  the  very  depths  of  sorrow,  and 
clung  to  without  faltering,  is  resignation.  It 
shall  bestow  peace  and  victory  in  the  end.  0  ! 
how  different  from  that  sullen  fatalism  that  lets 
things  come  as  they  will.  To  such  a  soul  things 
do  come  as  they  will,  and  it  hardens  under  them, 
—  they  do  come  as  they  will,  but  it  sees  not,  cares 
not,  why  they  come.  No  thought  goes  up  beyond 
the  cloud  to  God,  —  no  strength  is  born  that  shall 
make  life's  trials  lighter,  —  no  love  and  faith  that 
will  seek  the  Father's  hand  in  the  darkest  hour, 
and  shed  an  enduring  light  over  the  thorny  path 
of  affliction,  and  upon  the  bosom  of  the  grave. 
Look  at  these  two.  Outwardly,  their  calmness 
may  be  the  same.  Nay,  the  one  may  evince 
emotion  and  tears,  while  the  other  shall  stand  rigid 
in  the  hour  of  calamity,  with  a  bitter  smile,  or  a 
frown  of  endurance.  But  in  the  one  is  strength, 
in  the  other  rigidity ;  in  the  one  is  power  to 
triumph  over  sorrow,  in  the  other  only  nervous 


158  RESIGNATION. 

capacity  to  resist  it.  The  one  is  man  hardened 
to  indifference,  sullen  because  of  irreligion,  upon 
whom  some  sorrow  will  one  day  fall  that  will  peel 
him  to  the  quick,  and  he  will  not  know  where  to 
flee  for  healing.  The  other  is  man  contending 
against  evil,  yet  not  against  God,  —  man  with  all 
the  tenderness  and  strength  of  his  nature,  impres- 
sible yet  unconquerable,  walking  with  feet  that 
bleed  among  the  wounding  thorns,  and  a  heart  that 
shrinks  from  the  heavy  woe,  yet,  all  lacerated  as 
he  is,  able  to  walk  through,  because  he  holds  by 
the  hand  of  Omnipotence.  The  one  is  the  un- 
bending tree,  peeled  by  the  lightning  and  stripped 
by  the  north  wind,  lifting  its  gnarled  head  in  sul- 
len defiance  to  the  storm,  which,  when  the  storm 
does  overcome  it,  shall  be  broken.  The  other  also 
is  rooted  in  strength,  and  meets  the  rushing  blast 
with  a  lofty  front.  But  as  "it  smiles  in  sunshine, 
so  it  bends  in  storm,"  trustful  and  obedient,  yet 
firm  and  brave,  and  nothing  shall  overwhelm  it. 
I  trust  I  have  succeeded  in  impressing  upon  you 


RESIGNATION.  159 

the  difference  between  Christian  resignation  and 
mere  hardihood,  or  indifference.  Resignation  is 
born  of  discipline,  and  lives  only  in  a  truly  relig- 
ious soul.  We  have  seen  that  it  is  not  incompati- 
ble with  tenderness;  nay,  it  is  more  valuable, 
because  it  springs  up  in  natures  that  have  thus 
suffered  and  wept.  To  see  them  become  calm 
and  strong,  and  pass  with  unfaltering  step  through 
the  valley  of  affliction,  when,  but  now,  they 
shrunk  from  it,  is  a  proof  that  God  indeed  has 
strengthened  them,  and  that  they  have  had  com- 
munion with  him.  The  unbeliever's  stubbornness 
may  endure  to  the  end,  but  no  human  power  could 
inspire  this  sudden  and  triumphant  calmness. 

And  even  when  the  crisis  is  past,  when  the 
sorrow  is  sealed,  it  is  not  rebellion  to  sigh  and 
weep.  Our  Father  has  made  us  so.  He  has 
opened  the  springs  of  love  that  well  up  within  us, 
and  can  we  help  mourning  when  they  turn  to 
tears  and  blood  ?  He  has  made  very  tender  the 
ties  that  bind  us  to  happiness,  and  can  we  fail  to 


160  RESIGNATION. 

shrink  and  suffer  when  they  are  cut  asunder? 
When  we  have  labored  long  in  the  light  of  hope, 
and  lo !  it  goes  out  in  darkness,  and  the  blast  of 
disappointment  rushes  upon  us,  can  we  help  being 
sad  ?  Can  the  mother  prevent  weeping  when  she 
kisses  the  lips  of  her  infant  that  shall  prattle  to 
her  no  more ;  when  she  presses  its  tiny  hand,  so 
cold  and  still,  —  the  little  hand  that  has  rested 
upon  her  bosom,  and  twined  in  her  hair ;  and  even 
when  it  is  so  sweet  and  beautiful  that  she  could 
strain  it  to  her  heart  forever,  it  is  laid  away  in  the 
envious  concealment  of  the  grave  ?  Can  the  wife, 
or  the  husband,  help  mourning,  when  the  partner 
and  counsellor  is  gone,  —  when  home  is  made  very 
desolate  because  the  familiar  voice  sounds  not 
there,  and  the  cast-oflF  garment  of  the  departed  is 
strangely  vacant,  and  the  familiar  face  has  van- 
ished, never  more  to  return  ?  Can  the  child  fail 
to  lament,  when  the  father,  the  mother,  —  the 
being  who  nurtured  him  in  infancy,  who  pillowed 
his  head  in  sickness,  who  prayed  for  him  with 


RESIGNATION.  161 

tears  in  his  sinful  wandering,  who  ever  rejoiced 
in  his  joy  and  wept  in  his  sorrows,  —  can  he 
fail  to  weep  when  that  venerable  form  lies  all 
enshrouded,  and  the  door  closes  upon  it,  and  the 
homestead  is  vacailt,  and  the  link  that  bound  him 
to  childhood  is  in  the  grave  ?  Say,  can  we  check 
the  gush  of  sorrow  at  any  of  life's  sharp  trials 
and  losses  ?  No ;  nor  are  we  forbidden  to  weep, 
nor  would  we  be  human  if  we  did  not  weep,  —  if, 
at  least,  the  spirit  did  not  quiver  when  the  keen 
scathing  goes  over  it.  But  haw  shall  we  weep  ? 
0  !  Thou,  who  didst  suffer  in  Gethsemane,  thou 
hast  taught  us  how.  By  thy  sacred  sorrow  and 
thy  pious  obedience  thou  hast  taught  us ;  by  thy 
great  agony  and  thy  sublime  victory  thou  hast 
taught  us.  We  must  refer  all  to  God.  We  must 
earnestly,  sincerely  say,  "  Thy  will  be  done." 
Then  our  prayers  will  be  the  source  of  our 
strength.  Then  our  sorrowing  will  bring  us  com- 
fort. "  Thy  will  be  done ;"  repeat  this,  feel  this, 
realize  its  meaning  and  its  relations,  and  you  shall 
11 


162  RESIGNATION. 

be  able  to  say,  with  a  rooted  calmness,  "  The  cup 
which  my  Father  hath  given  me,  shall  I  not  drink 
it?" 

"  The  cup  which  my  Father  hath  given  me, 
shall  I  not  drink  it?  "  Who  shall  be  able  to  say 
this  as  Jesues  said  it?  They  who  struggle  as 
he  struggled,  —  who  obey  as  he  obeyed,  —  who 
trust  as  he  trusted.  There  are  those  upon  earth 
who  have  been  able  to  say  it.  It  has  made  them 
stronger  and  happier.  There  are  those  in  heaven 
who  have  been  able  to  say  it  They  have  gone 
up  from  earthly  communions  to  the  communion  on 
high.  Do  you  not  see  them  there,  walking  so 
serenely  by  the  still  waters,  with  palms  about 
their  brows  ?  Serenely  —  for  in  their  faces  noth- 
ing is  left  of  their  conflict  but  its  triumph  ;  nothing 
of  their  swollen  agony  but  the  massy,  enduring 
strength  it  has  imparted.  They  have  ceased  from 
their  trials,  but  first  they  learned  how  to  endure 
them.  They  submitted,  but  they  were  not  over- 
whelmed.    When   sorrow  came,   each   pious  soul 


RESIGNATION  163 

Struggled,  but  trusted ;  and  so  it  was  able  to  meet 
the  last  struggle,  — was  able  to  say,  as  the  shadow 
of  death  fell  upon  it,  "  The  cup  which  my  Father 
hath  given  me,  shall  I  not  drink  it?"  They 
were  resigned.     Behold  —  theirs  is  the  victory  ! 


I 


&-. 


f |e  pssioii  of  fittlt  Cfeilkra. 


And  Jesus  called  a  little  child  unto  him,  and  set  him  in  the  midst  of 
them.    Matthew  xviii.  2. 


EVERYTHING  has  its  mission.  I  speak 
not  now  of  the  office  which  each  part  of 
the  great  universe  discharges.  I  speak  not  of  the 
relation  between  these  parts,  —  that  beautiful  ordi- 
nance by  which  the  whole  is  linked  together  in 
one  common  life,  bj  which  the  greatest  is  depen- 
dent upon  the  least,  and  the  least  shares  in  the 
benefactions  of  the  greatest.  In  this  sense,  every- 
thing has,  strictly,  its  mission.  But  I  speak  of 
the  influence,  the  instruction,  which  everything 
has,  or  may  have,  for  the  soul  of  man.  The 
flower,  and  the  star,  the  grass  of  the  field,  the 
outspread  ocean,  are  full  of  lessons ;  they  perform 


168         MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN. 

a  mission  to  our  spiritual  nature,  if  we  will  re- 
ceive it.  We  may  pass  them  by  as  simply  material 
forms,  the  decorations  or  conveniencies  of  this 
our  sensual  life.  But  if  we  will  come  to  them  in 
a  religious  spirit,  and  study  all  their  meaning,  they 
will  be  to  us  ministers  of  God,  impressive  and 
eloquent  as  human  lips,  and  filled  with  truths  in- 
structive as  any  that  man  can  utter. 

Jesus  illustrated  his  teachings  by  these  objects. 
He  made  everything  that  was  at  hand  perform  a 
mission  for  the  human  soul.  The  lilies  of  the 
field  were  clothed  with  spiritual  suggestion,  and 
the  fowls  of  the  air,  as  they  flew  through  the 
trackless  firmament,  bore  a  lesson  of  truth  and 
consolation.  As  if  to  show  that  there  is  nothing, 
however  small,  that  is  insignificant,  and  that  has 
not  its  mission,  he  selected  the  falling  sparrow  to 
be  a  minister  of  wisdom,  and  dignified  the  way- 
side well  as  a  clear  and  living  oracle  of  the  di- 
vinest  truth. 

In   the   instance  before  us,  the  object  selected 


MISSION    OF   LITTLE    CHILDREN.         169 

was  a  little  child.  In  reply  to  the  question,  "Who 
is  the  greatest  in  the  kingdom  of  heaven?  "  Jesus 
set  this  little  one  in  the  midst  of  his  disciples,  and 
said,  "  Verily  I  say  unto  you,  except  ye  be  con- 
verted, and  become  as  little  children,  ye  shall  not 
enter  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven."  Thus  did 
he  rebuke  their  sensuous  ideas  of  greatness  by  a 
spiritual  truth,  and  make  a  little  child  the  teacher 
of  profound  and  beautiful  wisdom.  I  do  not  pro- 
pose, however,  at  this  time,  to  dwell  upon  the 
precise  doctrines  which  Christ  taught  in  this  in- 
stance, but  having,  as  it  were,  the  little  child 
set  in  our  midst,  to  draw  from  it  further  lessons 
that  may  do  us  good.  In  one  word,  I  propose  to 
speak  of  the  mission  of  little  children. 

In  using  this  term  "  missio?i,^^  I  wish  to  have 
no  obscurity  about  my  meaning.  I  refer,  by  it, 
to  the  influence  which  little  children  may  exert 
upon  us,  —  to  the  effects  which  they  may  produce, 
—  rather  than  to  any  direct  object  which  they  can 
have  in  view,  or  for  which  they  set  themselves  to 


170         MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN. 

work.  They  may  be  unconscious  missionaries ; 
indeed,  to  a  great  extent,  they  are  so.  But  so  are 
the  lilies  of  the  field  and  the  birds  of  the  air. 
Yet  if  we  believe  that  God  is  the  ordainer  of 
all  wisdom  and  of  all  good,  that  he  uses  an  object 
or  event  in  numberless  ways,  and  makes  it  the 
unconscious  instrument  of  many  of  his  plans,  then 
we  may  say  that  children  are  sent  by  him  for  the 
express  purpose  of  producing  these  eflfects,  and  in 
that  sense  have  a  mission, 

I  pass  to  consider  some  of  the  modes  in  which 
that  mission  is  accomplished. 

I.  Little  children  give  us  a  sincere  and  af- 
fectionate manifestation  of  human  nature.  I 
know  that  even  a  child  will  soon  become  artful, 
and  imbibe  the  spirit  of  dealing  and  of  policy. 
But,  in  a  strongly  comparative  sense,  the  child  is 
artless.  The  thoughts  of  the  heart  leap  spontane- 
ously from  the  lips.  The  bubbling  impulse  is 
closely  followed  by  the  action.  Its  desire,  its 
aversion,  its  love,  its  curiosity,  are  expressed  with- 


MISSION    OF   LITTLE    CHILDREN.         171 

out  modification.  That  broken  prattle,  those  half- 
pronounced  words,  are  uttered  with  clear,  ringing 
tones  of  sincerity.  There  is  no  coil  of  deceit  about 
the  heart.  There  are  no  secrets  chambered  in  the 
brain.  The  countenance  has  put  on  no  disguise. 
There  is  no  manoeuvring  with  lips  or  actions,  no 
suspicion  or  plotting  in  the  eyes.  It  is  simple 
human  nature  fresh  from  the  hands  of  God,  with 
all  its  young  springs  in  motion,  trying  themselves 
in  their  simplicity  and  their  newness.  The  eyes 
open  upon  the  world,  not  with  speculation,  but 
Avith  wonder.  To  them,  the  ancient  hills  and 
the  morning  stars  are  just  created,  new  phe- 
nomena burst  upon  them  every  moment,  and 
nature  in  a  thousand  channels  pours  itself  into 
the  young  soul.  And  how  soon  it  learns  the 
meaning  of  a  mother's  smile,  and  the  protection  of 
a  father's  hand !  How  soon  the  fountains  of  afiec- 
tion  are  unsealed,  and  the  mystery  of  human  love 
takes  possession  of  its  heart !  But  the  tides  of 
that   love   are   controlled   by  no   calculation,  are 


172         MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN. 

fettered  bj  no  proprieties,  but  flow  artlessly  and 
freely. 

Humanity  soon  runs  into  deceit,  and  the  sin- 
cerest  man  wears  a  mask.  We  cannot  trust  our 
most  familiar  friends,  to  the  whole  extent.  We 
all  retain  something  in  our  inmost  hearts  that  no- 
body knows  but  we  and  God.  The  world  bids 
us  be  shrewd  and  politic.  We  walk  in  a  mart 
of  selfishness.  Eyes  stare  upon  us,  and  we  are 
afraid  of  them.  We  meet  as  traders,  as  partisans, 
as  citizens,  as  worshippers,  as  friends  —  brothers, 
if  you  will  —  but  we  must  not  surrender  too  much 
confiidence,  we  must  not  express  all  we  think, 
we  must  school  ourselves  in  some  respects,  — 
must  adopt  some  conventionalities.  There  is  some 
degree  of  isolation  between  ourselves  and  every 
other  one.  But  from  the  world's  strife  and 
sordidness,  its  wearisome  forms  and  cold  sus- 
picions, we  may  turn  to  the  sanctity  of  home,  and, 
if  we  have  a  child  there,  we  shall  find  affection 
without  alloy,  a  welcome  that  leaps  from  the  heart 


MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN.         173 

in  sunshine  to  the  face,  and  speaks  right  from 
the  soul ;  —  a  companion  who  is  not  afraid  or 
ashamed  of  us,  who  makes  no  calculation  about 
our  friendship,  who  has  faith  in  it,  and  requires 
of  us  perfect  faith  in  return,  and  whose  sincerity 
rebukes  our  worldliness,  and  makes  us  wonder  at 
the  world.  And  if  all  this  makes  us  better  and 
happier,  if  it  keeps  our  hearts  from  hardness  and 
attrition,  if  it  begets  in  us  something  of  the  same 
sincerity,  and  hallows  us  with  something  of  the 
same  affection,  if  it  softens  and  purifies  us  at  all, 
then  do  not  children,  in  this  respect  perform  a 
mission  for  us  ? 

And  shall  we  not  learn  from  them  more  confi- 
dence in  human  nature,  seeing  that  "  the  child  is 
father  to  the  man,"  and  that  much  that  seems 
cold  and  hard  in  men  may  conceal  the  remains  of 
childhood's  better  feeling?  And,  also,  shall  it 
not  make  us  deplore  and  guard  against  those 
influences  which  can  change  the  sincere  and  loving 
child  into  the   deceitful  and   selfish   man  —  that 


174         MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN. 

cover  the  spring  of  genuine  feeling  with  the 
thick  rime  of  worldlinesS;  and  petrify  the  tender 
chords  of  the  heart  into  rough,  unfeeling  sinews  ? 
The  man  should  not  be,  in  all  respects,  as  the 
child.  The  child  cannot  have  the  glory  of  the 
man.  If  it  is  not  polluted  by  his  vices,  it  is  not 
ennobled  by  his  virtues.  But  in  so  much  as  the 
child  awakens  in  us  tenderness,  and  teaches  us 
sincerity,  and  counteracts  our  coarser  and  harder 
tendencies,  and  cheers  us  in  our  isolation  from 
human  hearts,  by  binding  us  close  Avith  a  warm 
affection,  and  sheds  ever  around  our  path  the  mir- 
rored sunshine  of  our  youth  and  our  simplicity,  in 
so  much  the  child  accomplishes  for  us  a  blessed 
mission. 

II.  Children  teach  us  faith  and  conjidence. 
Man  soon  becomes  proud  with  reason,  and  impa- 
tient of  restraint.  He  thinks  he  knows,  or  ought 
to  know,  the  whole  mystery  of  the  universe.  It 
is  not  easy  for  him  to  take  anything  upon  trust; 
or  to  lie  low  in  the  hand  of  God.     But  the  child 


MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN.         175 

is  full  of  faith.  He  is  not  old  enough  to  speculate, 
and  the  things  he  sees  are  to  him  so  strange  and 
wonderful  that  he  can  easily  believe  in  "the  things 
that  are  unseen."  He  propounds  many  questions, 
but  entertains  no  doubts  as  to  God  and  heaven. 
And  what  confidence  has  he  in  his  father's  govern- 
ment and  his  mother's  providence  ! 

I  do  not  say,  here,  that  a  man's  faith  should 
be  as  a  child's  faith.  Man  must  examine  and 
reason,  contend  with  doubt,  and  wander  through 
mystery.  But  I  would  have  him  cherish  the 
feeling  that  he  too  is  a  child,  the  denizen  of  a 
Father's  house,  and  have  sufficient  confidence  in 
that  Father  to  trust  his  goodness ;  and  to  remem- 
ber, if  things  look  perplexed  and  discordant  to  him, 
that  his  vision  is  but  a  child's  vision  —  he  cannot 
see  all.  Indeed,  there  is  a  beautiful  analogy  be- 
tween a  child  in  its  father's  house  and  man  in 
the  universe,  and  much  there  is  in  the  filial  senti- 
ment that  belongs  to  both  conditions.  Beautifully 
has  it  been   shown   by  a   recent   writer  how  the 


176         MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN. 

natural  operation  of  this  sentiment  in  the  child's 
heart,  and  in  the  sphere  of  home,  stands  somewhat 
in  the  place  of  that  religion  which  man  needs  in 
his  maturer  conditions.  "  God  has  given  it,  in 
its  very  lot,"  says  he,  "a  religion  of  its  own,  the 
sufficiency  of  which  it  were  impiety  to  doubt. 
The  child's  veneration  can  scarcely  climb  to  any 
loftier   height   than  the  soul  of  a  wise  and  good 

parent How  can  there  be  for  him  diviner 

truth  than  his  father's  knowledge,  a  more  won- 
drous world  than  his  father's  experience,  a  better 
providence  than  his  mother's  vigilance,  a  securer 
fidelity  than  in  their  united  promise?  Encom- 
passed round  by  these,  he  rests  as  in  the  embrace 
of  the  only  omniscience  he  can  comprehend."* 

But  0 !  my  friends,  when  our  childhood  has 
passed  by,  and  we  go  out  to  drink  the  mingled 
cup  of  life,  and  cares  come  crowding  upon  us,  and 
hopes  are  crushed,  and  doubts  wrestle  with  us,  and 

*  Martineau. 


MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN.         177 

sorrow  burdens  our  P}jirits,  then  we  need  a  deeper 
faith,  and  look  up  for  a  stronger  Father.  A  kind 
word  will  not  stifle  our  grief  then.  We  cannot 
go  to  sleep  upon  our  mother's  arms,  and  forget  it 
all.  There  is  no  charm  to  bold  our  spirits  within 
the  walls  of  this  home,  the  earth.  Our  thoughts 
crave  more  than  this.  Our  souls  reach  out  over 
the  grave,  and  cry  for  something  after !  No 
bauble  will  assuage  this  bitterness.  It  is  spiritual 
and  stern,  and  we  must  have  a  word  from  heaven 
—  a  promise  from  one  who  is  able  to  fulfill.  We 
look  around  us,  and  find  that  Father,  and  his  very 
nature  contains  the  promise  that  we  need.  And 
as  the  child  in  his  ignorance  has  faith,  not  because 
he  can  demonstrate^  but  because  it  is  his  father, 
so  let  us,  in  our  ignorance,  feel  that  in  this  great 
universe  of  many  mansions,  of  solemn  mysteries,  of 
homes  beyond  the  earth,  of  relationships  that  reach 
through  eternity,  of  plans  only  a  portion  of  which 
is  seen  here;  so  let  us  look  up  as  to  a  Father's 
face,  take  hold  of  his  hand,  go  in  and  out  and  lie 
12 


178         MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN. 

down  securely  in  his  presence,  and  cherish  faith. 
If  children  onlj  teach  us  to  do  this,  how  beautiful 
and  how  great  is  their  mission  ! 

III.  Children  awaken  in  us  new  and  power- 
ful affections.  Nobody  but  a  parent  can  realize 
what  these  affections  are,  can  tell  what  a  fountain 
of  emotion  the  newborn  child  unseals,  what  chords 
of  strange  love  are  drawn  out  from  the  heart,  that 
before  lay  there  concealed.  One  may  have  all 
powers  of  intellect,  a  refined  moral  culture,  a  noble 
and  wide-reaching  philanthropy,  and  yet  a  child 
born  to  him  shall  awaken  within  him  a  depth  of 
tenderness,  a  sentiment  of  love,  a  yearning  affec- 
tion, that  shall  surprise  him  as  to  the  capacity  and 
the  mystery  of  his  nature. 

And  the  relation  of  a.  mother  to  her  child ;  what 
other  is  like  it?  Without  it,  how  undeveloped  is 
the  great  element  of  affection,  how  small  a  horn  of 
its  orb  is  filled  and  lighted  !  What  was  she  until 
that  new  love  woke  up  within  her,  and  her  heart 
and  soul  thrilled  with  it,  and  first  truely  lived  in 


\ 


MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN.         179 

it  ?  Of  all  the  degrees  of  human  love,  how  amply 
is  this  the  highest !  In  all  the  depths  of  human 
love,  how  surely  is  this  the  nethermost !  When 
illustrations  fail  us,  how  confidently  do  we  seize 
upon  this  !  The  mother  nurturing  her  child  in 
tenderness,  watching  over  it  with  untiring  love  ! 
0  !  that  is  affection  stronger  than  any  of  this 
earth.  It  has  a  power,  a  beauty,  a  holiness,  like 
no  other  human  sentiment.  When  that  child  has 
grown  to  maturity,  and  has  gone  out  from  her  in 
profligacy  and  in  scorn;  when  the  world  has 
denounced  him,  and  justice  sets  its  price  upon  his 
head,  and  lovers  and  companions  fall  off  from  him 
in  utter  loathing  —  we  do  not  ask,  we  know,  there 
is  one  heart  that  cannot  reject  him.  No  sin  of  his 
can  paralyze  the  chord  that  vibrates  there  for  him. 
No  alienation  can  cancel  the  affection  that  was 
bom  at  his  birth,  that  pillowed  him  in  his  infancy, 
centred  in  him  its  life,  clasped  him  with  its 
strength,  and  shed  upon  him  its  blessings,  its 
hopes,  and  its  prayers. 


180         MISSION    OF   LITTLE    CHILDREN. 

And  no  one  feels  the  death  of  a  child  as  a 
mother  feels  it.  Even  the  father  cannot  realize 
it  thus.  There  is  a  vacancy  in  his  home,  and 
a  heaviness  in  his  heart.  There  is  a  chain  of 
association  that  at  set  times  comes  round  with  its 
broken  link;  there  are  memories  of  endearment, 
a  keen  sense  of  loss,  a  weeping  over  crushed  hopes, 
and  a  pain  of  wounded  affection.  But  the  mother 
feels  that  one  has  been  taken  away  who  was  still 
closer  to  her  heart.  Hers  has  been  the  office  of 
constant  ministration.  Every  gradation  of  feature 
has  developed  before  her  eyes.  She  has  detected 
every  new  gleam  of  intelligence.  She  heard  the 
first  utterance  of  every  new  word.  She  has  been 
the  refuge  of  his  fears ;  the  supply  of  his  wants. 
And  every  task  of  affection  has  woven  a  new  link, 
and  made  dear  to  her  its  object.  And  when  he 
dies,  a  portion  of  her  own  life,  as  it  were,  dies. 
How  can  she  give  him  up,  with  all  these  memo- 
ries, these  associations?  The  timid  hands  that  have 
so  often  taken  hers  in  trust  and  love,  how  can  she 


MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN.         181 

fold  them  on  his  breast,  and  surrender  them  to  the 
cold  clasp  of  death  ?  The  feet  whose  wanderings 
she  has  watched  so  narrowly,  how  can  she  see  them 
straitened  to  go  down  into  the  dark  valley  ?  The 
head  that  she  has  pressed  to  her  lips  and  her 
bosom,  that  she  has  watched  in  burning  sickness 
and  in  peaceful  slumber,  a  hair  of  which  she  could 
not  see  harmed,  0  !  how  can  she  consign  it  to  the 
chamber  of  the  grave?  The  form  that  not  for 
one  night  has  been  beyond  her  vision  or  her 
knowledge,  how  can  she  put  it  away  for  the  long 
night  of  the  sepulchre,  to  see  it  here  no  more? 
Man  has  cares  and  toils  that  draw  away  his 
thoughts  and  employ  them ;  she  sits  in  loneliness, 
and  all  these  memories,  all  these  suggestions, 
crowd  upon  her.  How  can  she  bear  all  this?  She 
could  not,  were  it  not  that  her  faith  is  as  her 
affection ;  and  if  the  one  is  more  deep  and  tender 
than  in  man,  the  other  is  more  simple  and  spon- 
taneous, and  takes  confidently  hold  of  the  hand  of 
God. 


182         MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN. 

Thus,  then,  do  children  awaken  within  us  deep 
and  mighty  affections;  and  is  it  not  their  mission 
to  do  so  ?  Do  we  not  see  many  beautiful  offices 
created  and  discharged  by  these  affections — tender 
and  far-reaching  relationships  into  which  they 
run  ?  Do  we  not  see  how  they  win  the  heart  from 
frivolity  and  selfishness,  and  make  it  aware  of 
duties,  and  quick  with  sympathies?  I  shall  not 
enter  into  detailed  considerations  of  the  results  of 
this  affection  thus  awakened  in  us  by  children.  A 
little  reflection  will  render  them  obvious  to  you. 
Let  me  simply  say,  that  in  awakening  these 
affections  children  discharge  an  important  and 
beautiful  mission. 

IV.  I  might  speak  of  other  offices  discharged 
by  little  children  ;  of  the  influence  upon  us  of  their 
purity  and  their  innocence ;  their  importance  in  the 
social  state ;  of  the  benefits  conferred  upon  us  by 
the  very  duties  which  we  exercise  toward  them. 
But  merely  suggesting  these,  I  will  speak  at  this 
time  of  but   one   more   mission  which  they  per- 


MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN.  183 

form  for  us.  And  this,  my  friends,  is  performed 
through  sadness  and  through  tears.  The  little 
child  performs  it  by  its  death.  It  has  been  with 
us  a  little  while.  We  have  enjoyed  its  bright 
and  innocent  companionship  by  the  dusty  highway 
of  life,  in  the  midst  of  its  toils,  its  cares,  and  its 
sin.  It  has  been  a  gleam  of  sunshine  and  a  voice 
of  perpetual  gladness  in  our  homes.  We  have 
learned  from  it  blessed  lessons  of  simplicity,  sin- 
cerity, purity,  faith.  It  has  unsealed  within  us 
this  gushing,  never-ebbing  tide  of  affection.  Sud- 
denly, it  is  taken  away.  We  miss  the  gleam  of 
sunshine.  We  miss  the  voice  of  gladness.  Our 
homes  are  dark  and  silent.  We  ask,  "  Shall  it 
not  come  again  ?  "  And  the  answer  breaks  upon 
us  through  the  cold,  gray  silence,  ^'•Nevermore! ''' 
We  say  to  ourselves  again  and  again,  "  Can  ^it  be 
possible?"  "Do  we  not  dream?"  "Will  not" 
that  life  and  affection  return  to  us?"  '■'■  Never- 
more V  0  !  nevermore !  The  heart  is  like  an 
empty   mansion,    and    that    word    goes    echoing 


184         MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN. 

through  its  desolate  chambers.  We  are  stricken 
and  afflicted.  But  must  this,  should  this,  be 
always  and  only  so  ?  Are  we  not  looking  merely 
at  the  earthly  aspect  of  the  event  ?  Has  it  not 
a  spiritual  phase  for  us  ?  Nay,  do  we  not  begin 
to  consider  how  through  our  temporal  affection 
an  eternal  good  is  wrought  out  for  us  ?  Do  we 
not  begin  to  realize  that  in  our  souls  we  have 
derived:  profit  from  it  already?  Do  we  not 
begin  to  learn  that  life  is  not  a  holiday  or  a 
workday  only,  but  a  disciplbie,  —  that  God 
conducts  that  discipline  in  infinite  wisdom  and 
benevolence,  —  mingles  the  draught,  and,  when 
he  sees  fit,  infuses  bitterness?  Not  that  constant 
sweet  would  not  please  us  better,  but  that  our 
discipline,  which  is  of  more  importance  than 
our  indulgence,  will  be  more  effectual  thereby. 
This  is  often  talked  about;  I  ask,  do  not  we 
who  are  called  upon  to  mourn  the  loss  of  chil- 
dren realize  it,  —  actually  realize  that  that  loss 
is  for  our  spiritual  gain  ?     If  we  do  not,  we  are 


MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN.  185 

merely  looking  upon  the  earthlj  phase  of  our 
loss.  If  we  do  not  realize  this  spiritual  good,  we 
may. 

Yes,  in  death  the  little  child  has  a  mission 
for  us.  Through  that  very  departure  he  accom- 
plishes for  us,  perhaps,  what  he  could  not  ac- 
complish by  his  life.  These  affections  which 
he  has  awakened,  we  have  considered  how  strong 
they  are.  They  are  stronger,  are  they  not,  than 
any  attachment  to  mere  things  of  this  earth? 
But  that  child  has  gone  from  us,  —  gone  into 
the  unseen,  the  spiritual  world.  What  then  ?  Do 
our  affections  sink  back  into  our  hearts,  —  become 
absorbed  and  forgotten  ?  0,  no !  They  reach 
out  after  that  little  one ;  they  follow  him  into  the 
unseen  and  spiritual  world.  Thus  are  we  brought 
in  contact  with  that  world,  —  thus  is  it  made  a 
great  and  vivid  reality  to  us,  —  perhaps  for  the 
first  time.  We  have  talked  of  it,  we  have  be- 
lieved in  it;  but  now  that  our  dead  have  gone 
into  it,  we  have,  as  it  were,  entered  it  ourselves. 


186         MISSION    OF   LITTLE    CHILDREN. 

Its  atmosphere  is  around  us,  chords  of  affection 
draw  us  toward  it,  the  faces  of  our  departed  ones 
look  out  from  it  —  and  it  is  a  reality.  And 
is  it  not  worth  something  to  make  it  such  a 
reality  ? 

We  are  wedded  to  this  world.  It  is  beauti- 
ful, it  is  attractive,  it  is  real.  Immortality  is  a 
pleasant  thought.  The  spiritual  land  is  an  object 
of  faith.  But  the  separation  between  this  and 
that  is  cold  to  think  of,  and  hard  to  bear.  It 
needs  something  stronger  than  this  earfti  to  draw 
us  toward  that  spiritual  world ;  to  break  some 
of  the  thousand  tendrils  that  bind  us  here.  My 
friends,  though  many  powerful  appeals,  many 
solid  arguments,  cannot  break  our  affections  from 
this  earth,  the  hand  of  a  departed  child  can  do  it. 
The  voice  that  calls  us  to  unseen  realities,  that 
bids  us  prepare  for  the  heavenly  land,  that  says 
from  heights  of  spiritual  bliss  and  purity,  "  Come 
up  hither ;"  —  that  voice  is  the  voice  that  we  loved 
so  on  earth,  and  gladly  can  we  rise  and  follow  it. 


mSSION    OF   LITTLE    CHILDREN.         187 

Behold,  then,  what  a  little  child  can  perform 
for  us  through  its  death  !  It  makes  real  and 
attractive  to  us  that  spiritual  world  to  which  it  has 
gone,  and  it  calls  our  affections  from  earth  to  that 
true  life  which  is  the  great  end  of  our  being,  which 
is  the  object  of  all  our  discipline,  our  mingled  joy 
and  suffering,  here  upon  earth.  That  little  child, 
gone  from  its  sufferings  so  early,  —  gone 

"  Gentle  and  undefiled,  with  blessings  on  its  head,"  — 

has  it  indeed  become  a  very  angel  of  God  for  us, 
and  is  it  calling  us  to  a  more  spiritual  life,  and 
does  it  win  us  to  heaven  ?  Is  its  memory  around 
us  like  a  pure  presence  into  which  no  thought  of 
sin  can  readily  enter  ?  Or  is  it  with  us,  even  yet, 
a  spiritual  companion  of" our  ways?  From  being 
the  guarded  and  the  guided,  has  it  risen  in  infant 
innocence,  yet  in  the  knowledge  and  majesty  of 
the  immortal  life,  to  be  the  guard  and  the  guide  ? 
Does  it,  indeed,  make  our  hearts  softer  and  purer, 


188         MISSION    OF    LITTLE    CHILDREN. 

and  cause  us  to  think  more  of  duty,  and  live 
more  holy,  thus  clothing  ourselves  to  go  and  dwell 
with  it?  Does  it,  by  its  death,  accomplish  all 
this  ?  0 !  most  important,  most  glorious  mission 
of  all,  if  we  only  heed  it,  if  we  only  accept 
it.  Then  shall  we  behold  already  the  wisdom  and 
benevolence  of  our  Father  breaking  through  the 
cloud  that  overshadows  us.  Already  shall  we  see 
that  the  tie,  which  seemed  to  be  dropped  and 
broken,  God  has  taken  up  to  draw  us  closer  to 
himself,  and  that  it  is  interwoven  with  his  all- 
gracious  plan  for  our  spiritual  profit  and  perfec- 
tion. And  we  can  anticipate  how  it  will  all  be 
reconciled,  when  his  own  hand  shall  wipe  away 
our  tears,  and  the  bliss  of  reunion  shall  extract 
the  last  drop  of  bitterness  from  "  the  cup  that  our 
Father  hath  given  us." 


§m  '§tUmm  k  tjje  gtpartei^. 


She  is  not  dead,  but  sleepeth.    Lukb  viii.  62. 


^  GREAT  peculiarity  of  the  Christian  re- 
ligion is  its  transforming  or  transmuting 
power.  I  speak  not  now  of  the  regenera- 
tion which  it  accomplishes  in  the  individual  soul, 
but  of  the  change  which  it  works  upon  things 
without.  It  applies  the  touchstone  to  everj  fact 
of  existence,  and  exposes  its  real  value.  Looking 
through  the  lens  of  spiritual  observation,  it  throws 
the  realities  of  life  into  a  reverse  perspective  from 
that  which  is  seen  by  the  sensual  eye.  Objects 
which  the  world  calls  great  it  renders  insignificant, 
and  makes  near  and  prominent  things  which  the 
frivolous  put  far  off.     Thus  the  Christian,  among 


192         RELATIONS    TO    THE    DEPARTED. 

Other  men,  often  appears  anomalous.  Often, 
amidst  the  congratulations  of  the  world,  he  detects 
reason  for  mourning,  and  is  penetrated  with  sorrow. 
On  the  contrary,  where  others  shrink,  he  walks 
undaunted,  and  converts  the  scene  of  dread  and 
suffering  into  an  ante-chamber  of  heaven.  In  this 
light,  the  Apostle  Paul  speaks  of  himself  and  others, 
"  As  sorrowful,  yet  always  rejoicing ;  as  poor,  yet 
making  many  rich ;  as  having  nothing,  and  yet 
possessing  all  things."  Indeed,  all  the  beatitudes 
are  based  upon  this  peculiarity;  for  the  true 
blessing,  the  inward,  everlasting  riches,  are  for 
those  who,  in  the  world's  eye,  are  poor,  and 
mourning,  and  persecuted.  Jesus  himself  weeps 
amid  triumphant  palms  and  sounding  hosannas, 
while  on  the  cross  he  utters  the  prayer  of  forgive- 
ness, and  the  ejaculation  of  peace. 

No  wonder,  then,  that  the  believer  views  the 
ghastliest  fact  of  all  in  a  consoling  and  even  a 
beautiful  aspect;  and  death  itself  becomes  but 
sleep.     Well  was  that  trait  of  our  religion  which 


RELATIONS   TO    THE   DEPA.RTED.         193 

I  have  now  suggested  illustrated  at  the  bed-side 
of  Jairus'  daughter.  Well  did  that  noisy,  la- 
menting group  represent  the  worldly  who  read 
only  the  material  fact,  or  that  flippant  scepticism 
which  laughs  all  supernatural  truth  to  scorn. 
And  well  did  Jesus  represent  the  spirit  of  his 
doctrine,  and  its  transforming  power,  when  he 
exclaimed,  *'  She  is  not  dead,  but  sleepeth." 

Yes !  beautifully  has  Christianity  transformed 
death.  To  the  eye  of  flesh  it  was  the  final 
direction  of  our  fate,  —  the  consummate  riddle  in 
this  mystery  of  being,  —  the  wreck  of  all  our 
hopes,  — 

"  The  simple  senses  crowned  his  head, 
Omega  !  thou  art  Lord,  they  said  ; 
We  find  no  motion  in  the  dead." 

Ever,  though  with   higher   desires   and   better 

gleamings,  the  mind  has  struggled  and  sunk  before 

this  fact  of  decay,  and  this  awful  silence  of  nature ; 

while  in  the  waning  light  of  the  soul,  and  among 

13 


194         RELATIONS    TO    THE    DEPARTED. 

the  ashes  of  the  sepulchre,  scepticism  has  built  its 
dreary  negation.  And  though  no  mother  could 
lay  down  her  child  without  taking  hints  which 
God  gave  her  from  every  little  flower  that  sprung 
on  that  grassy  bed,  —  though  the  unexhausted 
intellect  has  reasoned  that  we  (mght  to  live  again, 
and  the  affections,  more  oracular,  swelling  with  the 
nature  of  their  great  source,  have  prophesied  that 
we  shall^  —  never,  until  the  revelation  of  Christ 
descended  into  our  souls,  and  illuminated  all  our 
spiritual  vision,  have  we  been  able  to  say  certainly 
of  death,  it  is  a  sleep.  This  has  made  its  outward 
semblance  not  that  of  cessation,  but  of  progres- 
sion —  not  an  end,  but  a  change  —  converting  its 
rocky  couch  to  a  birth-chamber,  over-casting  its 
shadows  with  beams  of  eternal  morning,  while 
behind  its  cold  unconsciousness  the  unseen  spirit 
broods  into  higher  life.  "  He  fell  asleep,^''  says 
the  sacred  chronicler,  speaking  of  bloody  Stephen. 
"  Our  friend  Lazarus  sleepeth^''  said  Christ  to  his 
disciples;  and  yet  again,  as  here  in  the  text,  the 


RELATIONS  TO   THE  DEPARTED.  195 

beautiful  synonyme  is  repeated,  "  She  is  not  dead, 
but  sleepeth." 

But  I  proceed  to  remark,  if  the  Christian  re- 
ligion thus  transforms  death,  or,  in  other  words, 
abolishes  the  idea  of  its  being  annihilation,  or  an 
end,  then  it  gives  us  a  new  view  of  aur  relatimis 
to  the  departed.  What  are  these  relations  ?  The 
answers  to  this  question  will  form  the  burden  of 
the  present  discourse. 

I.  There  is  the  relation  of  memory.  It  is  true, 
we  maj  argue  that  this  relation  exists  whether  the 
Christian  view  of  death  be  correct  or  not ;  —  so 
long  have  those  who  are  now  gone  actually  lived 
with  us,  —  so  vivid  are  their  images  among  the 
realities  of  the  soul,  —  though  the  grave  should 
forever  shut  them  from  our  communion.  But  this 
relation  of  memory  has  peculiar  propriety  and 
efficacy  when  associated  with  a  Christian  faith.  If 
the  dead  live  no  more,  what  would  memory  be  to 
us  but  a  spectre  and  a  sting?  Should  we  not 
then  seek  to  repress  these  tender  recollections,  — 


196  RELATIONS   TO    THE  DEPARTED. 

to  close  our  eyes  to  those  pale,  sad  visions  of 
departed  love?  Should  we  not  invoke  the  glare 
and  tumult  of  the  world  to  distract  or  absorb  our 
thoughts?  Would  we  not  say,  "Let  it  come,  the 
pleasure,  the  occupation  of  the  hour,  that  we  may 
think  no  more  of  the  dead,  plucked  from  us  for- 
ever, —  let  us  drive  thoughtlessly  down  this  swift 
current  of  life,  since  thought  only  harrows  us,  — 
let  us  drive  thoughtlessly  down,  enjoying  all  we 
can,  until  we  too  lie  by  the  side  of  those  departed 
ones,  like  them  to  moulder  in  everlasting  uncon- 
sciousness." I  do  not  say  that  this  would  always 
be  the  case  without  religious  hope,  but  it  is  a  very 
natural  condition  of  the  feelings  in  such  circum- 
stances, —  it  is  the  most  humane  alternative  that 
would  then  be  left.  At  least,  no  one  so  well  as 
the  Christian  can  go  into  the  inner  chambers  of 
memory,  feel  the  strength  of  its  sad  yet  blissful 
associations,  and  calmly  invoke  the  communion  of 
the  dead. 

I  speak  not  now  of  what  occurs  in  those  first 


RELATIONS    TO    THE   DEPARTED.         197 

bitter  days  of  grief,  when  the  heart's  wound  bleeds 
afresh  at  every  touch,  —  when  we  are  continually 
surprised  by  the  bleak  fact  that  the  loved  one  is 
actually  dead.  But  I  speak  of  those  after  seasons, 
those  Indian  summers  of  the  soul,  in  which  all  the 
present  desolation  is  blended  with  the  bloom  and 
enjoyment  of  the  past.  Then  do  we  find  that  the 
tie  which  binds  us  so  tenderly  to  the  departed  is  a 
strong  and  fruitful  one.  We  love,  in  those  still, 
retired  seasons,  to  call  up  the  images  of  the  dead, 
to  let  them  hover  around  us,  as  real,  for  the  hour, 
as  any  living  forms.  We  linger  in  that  commun- 
ion, with  a  pleasing  melancholy.  We  call  up  all 
that  was  lovely  in  their  character,  all  that  was 
delightful  in  their  earthly  intercourse.  They  live 
again  for  us,  and  we  for  them. 

In  this  relation  of  memory,  moreover,  we  realize 
the  fact,  that  while  the  departed  were  upon  earth 
we  enjoyed  much  with  them.  This  is  a  truth 
which  in  any  estimate  of  our  loss  we  should  not 
overlook.     Do  we  mourn  that  the  dead  have  been 


198         RELATIONS    TO    THE   DEPARTED. 

taken  from  us  so  soon  ?  Are  we  not  also  thankful 
that  they  were  ours  so  long?  In  our  grief  over 
unfulfilled  expectation,  do  we  cherish  no  gratitude 
for  actual  good  ?  So  much  bliss  has  God  mingled 
in  our  cup  of  existence  that  he  might  have  with- 
held. He  lent  it  to  us  thus  far ;  why  complain, 
rather,  that  he  did  not  intrust  us  with  it  longer  ? 
0  !  these  fond  recollections,  this  concentrated  hap- 
piness of  past  hours  which  we  call  up  with  tears, 
remind  us  that  so  much  good  we  have  actually 
experienced. 

In  close  connection  with  this  thought  is  the  fact, 
that,  by  some  delicate  process  of  refinement,  we 
remember  of  the  dead  only  what  was  good.  In 
the  relation  of  memory  we  see  them  in  their  best 
manifestation,  we  live  over  the  hours  of  our  past 
intercourse.  Though  in  extraordinary  instances  it 
may  be  true  that  "the  evil  which  men  do  lives  after 
them,"  yet  even  in  regard  to  the  illustrious  dead, 
their  imperfections  are  overlooked,  and  more  justice 
is  done  to  their  virtues  than  in  their  own  time. 


I 


RELATIONS    TO    THE   DEPARTED.         199 

Much  more  is  this  the  case  with  those  around 
whom  our  affections  cling  more  closely.  The  com- 
munion of  memory,  far  more  than  that  of  life,  is 
unalloyed  by  sharp  interruptions,  or  by  any  stain. 
That  communion  now,  though  saddened,  is  tender, 
and  without  reproach. 

And  even  if  we  remember  that  while  they  lived 
our  relations  with  them  were  all  beautiful,  shall 
we  not  believe  that  when  they  were  taken  away 
their  earthly  mission  for  us  was  fulfilled  ?  Was 
not  their  departure  as  essential  a  work  of  the 
divine  beneficence  as  their  bestowal  ?  Who  knows 
but  if  they  had  overstayed  the  appointed  hour,  our 
relations  with  them  might  have  changed  ?  —  some 
new  element  of  discontent  and  unhappiness  been 
introduced,  which  would  have  entirely  altered  the 
character  of  our  recollections?  At  least,  to  re- 
peat what  I  have  just  suggested,  what  Christian 
doubts  that  their  taking  away  —  this  change 
from  living  communion  to  the  communion  of 
memory  —  was   for  an  end  as  wise   and  kind  as 


200         RELATIONS   TO    THE    DEPAETED. 

were  all  the  love  and  intercourse  so  long  vouch- 
safed to  us  ? 

Vital,  then,  for  the  Christian,  is  this  relation 
which  we  have  with  the  dead  by  Tnemory.  We 
linger  upon  it,  and  find  in  it  a  strange  and  sweet 
attraction.  And  is  not  much  of  this  because, 
though  we  may  be  unconscious  of  it,  the  current 
of  faith  subtilely  intermingles  with  our  grief,  and 
gives  its  tone  to  our  communion?  We  cannot 
consider  the  departed  as  lost  to  us  forever.  The 
suggestion  of  rupture  holds  a  latent  suggestion  of 
reunion.  The  hues  of  memorg  are  colored  by  the 
reflection  of  hope.  Religion  transforms  the  con- 
dition of  the  departed  for  us,  and  we  consider 
them  not  as  dead,  but  sleeping. 

II.  There  is  another  relation  which  we  have 
with  the  dead,  —  the  relation  of  spiritual  exist- 
ence. We  live  with  them,  not  only  by  communion 
with  the  past,  by  images  of  momory,  but  by  that 
fine,  mysterious  bond  which  links  us  to  all  souls, 
and  in  which  we  live  with  them  now  and  forever. 


RELATIONS    TO    THE   DEPARTED.         201 

The  faith  that  has  converted  death  into  a  sleep  has 
also  transformed  the  whole  idea  of  life.  If  the  one 
is  but  a  halt  in  the  eternal  march,  —  a  slumbrous 
rest  preceding  a  new  morning,  —  the  other  is  but 
the  flow  of  one  continuous  stream,  mated  awhile 
with  flesh,  but  far  more  intimately  connected  with 
all  intelligences  in  the  universe  of  God,  What  are 
the  conditions  of  our  communion  with  the  living  — 
those  with  whom  we  come  in  material  contact? 
The  eye,  the  lip,  the  hand,  are  but  symbols,  in- 
terpretations ;  —  behind  these  it  is  only  spirit  that 
communes  with  spirit,  even  in  the  market  or  the 
street.  But  not  to  enter  into  so  subtle  a  discus- 
sion, of  what  kind  are  some  of  the  best  commun- 
ions which  we  have  on  earth  ?  We  take  up  some 
wise  and  virtuous  book,  and  enter  into  the  author's 
mind.  Seas  separate  us  from  him,  —  he  knows  us 
not ;  he  never  hears  our  names.  But  have  we  not 
a  close  relation  to  him?  Is  there  not  a  strong 
bond  of  spiritual  communion  between  us?  Nay, 
may  not  the  intercourse  we  thus  have  with  him  be 


202         RELATIONS    TO    THE    DEPARTED. 

better  and  truer  than  any  which  we  could  have 
from  actual  contact,  —  from  local  acquaintance  ? 
Then,  some  icy  barrier  of  etiquette  might  separate 
us,  —  some  coldness  of  temperament  upon  his  part, 
—  some  spleen  or  disease ;  we  might  be  shocked  by 
some  temporary  deformity ;  some  little  imperfection 
might  betray  itself.  But  here,  in  his  book,  which 
we  read  three  thousand  miles  away  from  him,  wo 
receive  his  noblest  thoughts,  —  his  best  spiritual 
revelations ;  and  we  know  him,  and  commune  with 
him  most  intimately,  not  through  local  but 
through  spiritual  affinities. 

And  how  pleasing  is  the  thought  that  not  even 
death  interrupts  this  relation.  Years,  as  well  as 
miles  —  ages  may  separate  us  from  the  great  and 
good  man ;  but  we  hold  with  him  still  that  living 
communion  of  the  spirit.  Our  best  life  may  flow 
to  us  from  this  communion.  Some  of  our  richest 
spiritual  treasures  have  been  deposited  in  this  in- 
tercourse of  thought.  Some  of  our  noblest  hopes 
and  resolutions  have  been  animated  by  those  whose 


RELATIONS    TO    THE    DEPARTED.         203 

lips  have  long  since  been  sealed,  —  whose  very 
monuments  have  crumbled. 

A  dear  friend  goes  away  from  us  to  a  foreign 
land.  We  watch  the  receding  sail,  and  feel  that 
that  is  a  bond  between  us,  until  it  fades  away  in 
the  far  blue  horizon.  Then  it  is  a  consolation  to 
walk  by  the  shore  of  that  sea,  and  to  realize  that 
the  same  waters  lave  the  other  shore,  where  he 
dwells,  —  to  watch  some  star,  and  know  that  at 
such  an  hour  his  eye  and  thought  are  also  directed 
to  it.  Thus  the  soul  will  not  entertain  the  idea  of 
absolute  separation,  but  makes  all  these  material 
objects  agents  for  its  affinities.  But  how  much 
nearer  does  that  sbsent  one  come  to  us,  when  we 
know  that  at  such  an  hour  we  both  are  kneeling  in 
prayer,  and  that  our  spirits  meet,  as  it  were, 
around  the  footstool  of  God  ! 

Thus  we  see  that  even  in  life  there  are  spiritual 
relations  which  bind  us  to  our  fellows,  and  that 
often  these  are  dearer  and  stronger  than  those  of 
local  contact.     Why  should  we  suppose  that  death 


204         RELATIONS    TO    THE   DEPARTED. 

cuts  off  all  such  affinities?  It  does  not  cut  them  off 
It  onlj  removes  the  loved  from  our  converse  and  our 
sight ;  but  if,  when  absent  in  some  distant  land  of 
this  earth,  we  are  conscious  of  still  holding  rela- 
tions to  them,  do  we  not  retain  the  same  though 
they  have  vanished  into  that  mysterious  and  un- 
seen land  which  lies  beyond  the  grave?  "  She  is 
not  dead,  but  sleepeth."  Christianity  has  taught 
us  to  look  away  from  the  ghastly  secrets  of  the 
sepulchre,  and  not  consider  that  changing  clay  as 
the  friend  we  mourn,  but  as  only  the  cast-off  and 
mouldering  garment.  It  has  kindled  within  us  a 
lively  appreciation  of  the  continued  existence  of 
those  who  have  gone  from  us;  taught  us  to  feel 
that  the  thoughts,  the  love,  the  real  life  of  the  de- 
parted, all,  in  fact,  that  communed  with  us  here 
below,  still  lives  and  acts.  And  our  relations  to 
them  are  the  relations  which  we  bear,  not  to 
abstractions  of  memory,  to  phantoms  of  by-gone 
joy,  but  to  spiritual  intelligences,  whose  current  of 
being  flows  on  uninterrupted,  with  whose  current 


RELATIONS    TO    THE    DEPARTED.         205 

of  being  our  own  mingles.  I  know  not  how  it  is 
with  others,  but  to  me  there  is  inexpressible  conso- 
lation in  this  thought. 

But  I  would  suggest  that,  as  spiritual  beings, 
we  bear  even  a  closer  relation  to  the  departed.  I 
said  that  Christianity  has  transformed  the  whole 
idea  of  life.  It  has  shown  that  we  are  essentially 
spirits,  and  that  our  highest  relations  are  spiritual. 
If  so,  it  seems  an  arrogant  assumption  to  deny  that 
any  intercourse  may  exist  between  ourselves  and  the 
spiritual  world.  Possessing  as  we  do  this  mysteri- 
ous nature,  throbbing  with  the  attraction  of  the 
eternal  sphere,  who  shall  say  that  it  touches  no 
spiritual  confines,  —  that  it  has  communion  only 
with  the  beings  that  we  see  ?  It  is  a  dull  atheism 
which  repudiates  all  such  intimations  as  supersti- 
tious or  absurd.  To  speak  more  distinctly,  I  al- 
lude to  the  consoling  thought  which  springs  up 
almost  intuitively,  that  the  departed  may,  at  times, 
see  us,  and  be  present  with  us,  though  we  do  not 
recognize  them.     For  wise  and  good  reasons,  our 


206         RELATIONS    TO    THE   DEPARTED. 

senses  may  so  constrain  us  that  we  cannot  perceive 
these  spiritual  beings.  But  the  same  reasons  do 
not  exist  to  shut  them  from  beholding  and  visiting 
us.  The  most  essential  idea  of  the  immortal  state 
is  that  it  yields  certain  prerogatives  which  we 
cannot  possess  in  our  mortal  condition.  May  it 
not  be,  therefore,  that  while  it  is  our  lot  to  be 
restricted  to  sensuous  vision,  and  to  behold  only 
material  forms,  it  is  their  privilege,  having  re- 
ceived the  spiritual  sight,  to  see  both  spiritual  and 
material  things  ? 

Nor  need  we  imagine  that  immortality  implies 
distance  from  us,  —  that  change  of  state  requires 
any  great  change  of  jtlace.  Looking  through  this 
earthly  glass,  we  see  but  darkly ;  but  when  death 
shatters  it  we  may  behold  close  around  us  the 
friends  we  have  loved,  and  find  that  their  spiritual 
peculiarity  is  not  incompatible  with  such  near 
residence.  The  homes  of  departed  spirits  may  be 
all  around  us,  —  those  spirits  themselves  may  be 
ever  hovering  near,  unseen  in  our  blindness  of  the 


RELATIONS    TO    THE   DEPARTED.         207 

senses.  At  all  events,  we  deem  it  one  of  the 
grand  distinctions  of  spirit  that  it  is  not  confined 
to  one  region  of  space,  but  maj  pass,  quick  as  its 
own  intelligence,  from  sphere  to  sphere.  And 
while  I  would  rebuke  rash  speculation,  I  would 
also  rebuke  the  cold  materialism  which  unhesi- 
tatingly rejects  an  idea  like  this  which  I  have  now 
sunrgested. 

I  maintain,  moreover,  that  such  speculation  is 
not  all  idle.  It  serves  to  quicken  within  us  the 
thought  of  how  near  the  dead  may  be  to  us,  to 
purify  that  thought,  and  to  breathe  upon  our  fe- 
vered hearts  a  consoling  hope.  And  when  I  com- 
bine its  intrinsic  reasonableness  with  the  spirit  and 
the  spiritualism  of  Christianity,  and  that  intuitive 
suggestion  which  springs  up  in  so  many  souls,  1 
can  urge  but  faint  objection  to  those  who  entertain 
it,  and  would,  if  possible,  share  and  diffuse  the 
comfort  which  it  gives.  Nearer,  then,  than  we 
imagine  —  close  as  in  mortal  contact,  and  more  in- 
timately —  may  be  those  whom  we,  with  earthly 


208         RELATIONS    TO    THE   DEPARTED. 

vision,  behold  no  more;  visiting  us  in  hours  of 
loneliness,  and  affording  unseen  companionship ; 
watching  us  in  the  stillness  of  slumber,  and  reflect- 
ing themselves  in  our  dreams. 

But,  whether  we  indulge  this  notion  or  not,  let 
us  realize  the  relation  which  we  have  with  the  de- 
parted by  the  ties  of  mutual  spirituality.  Let  us 
not  coldly  restrict  or  weaken  this  relation.  If  the 
material  world  is  full  of  inexplicable  things,  —  if 
we  cannot  explain  the  secret  affinities  of  the  star 
and  the  flower,  —  let  us  feel  how  full  of  mystery 
and  how  full  of  promise  is  this  spiritual  universe 
of  which  we  are  parts,  and  whose  conditions  we  so 
little  know.  Let  us  cherish  that  transcendent  faith, 
that  quick,  spiritual  sympathy,  which  says  of  the 
departed,  ''  They  are  not  dead,  but  sleeping." 

III.  Finally,  we  have  with  the  dead  the  relation 
of  discipline.  Though  we  should,  see  them  only 
in  the  abstractions  of  memory,  —  though  it  should 
be  true  that  they  have  no  spiritual  intercourse 
with  us,  —  yet  their  agency  in  our  behalf  has  not 


RELATIONS   TO    THE   DEPARTED.         209 

ceased.  They  still  accomplish  a  -work  for  us. 
That  work  is  in  the  moral  efficacy  of  bereavement 
and  sorrow.  In  their  going  away  they  lead  our 
thoughts  out  beyond  the  limits  of  this  world. 
They  quicken  us  to  an  interest  in  the  spiritual 
land.  As  one  who  looks  upon  a  map,  and  listlessly 
reads  the  name  of  some  foreign  shore,  so,  often,  do 
we  open  this  blessed  revelation  not  heeding  its 
recital  of  the  immortal  state.  But  as,  when  some 
friend  goes  to  that  distant  coast,  that  spot  on  the 
map  becomes,  of  all  places,  most  ^dvid  and  most 
prominent,  so,  when  our  loved  ones  die,  the  spirit- 
ual country  largely  occupies  our  thoughts  and  at- 
tracts our  affections.  They  depart  that  we  may 
be  weaned  from  earth.  They  ascend  that  we  may 
"  look  steadfastly  towards  heaven."  If  this  is  not 
our  everlasting  home,  why  should  they  all  remain 
here  to  cheat  us  with  that  thought  ?  If  we  must 
seek  a  better  country,  should  there  not  be  premoni- 
tions for  us,  breakings  up,  and  farewells,  and  the 
hurried  departure  of  friends  who  are  ready  before 
14 


210         RELATIONS    TO    THE    DEPARTED. 

US  ?  I  need  not  dwell  upon  this  suggestion.  Wc 
are  too  much  of  the  earth  earthy,  and  bound  up  in 
sensual  interests.  It  is  often  needful  that  some 
shock  of  disappointment  should  shake  our  idea  of 
terrestrial  stability  —  should  awake  us  to  a  sense 
of  our  spiritual  relations — should  strike  open  some 
chasm  in  this  dead,  material  wall,  and  let  in  the 
light  of  the  unlimited  and  immortal  state  to  which 
we  go.  We  need  the  discipline  of  bereavement  in 
temporal  things,  to  win  us  to  things  eternal.  And 
so,  in  their  departure,  the  loved  accomplish  for  us 
a  blessed  and  spiritual  result,  and  instead  of  being 
wholly  lost  to  us,  become  bound  to  us  by  a  new 
and  vital  relation. 

But  these  loved  ones  depart,  not  merely  to  bind 
our  affections  to  another  state,  but  to  fit  us  better 
for  the  obligations  of  this.  Perhaps,  in  the  indulg- 
ence of  full  communion,  in  the  liquid  ease  of  pros- 
perity, we  have  scantily  discharged  our  social  duties. 
We  have  not  appreciated  love,  because  we  have 
never  felt  its  absence.     We  have  shocked  the  ten- 


RELATIONS    TO    THE    DEPARTED.         211 

derest  ties,  because  we  were  ignorant  of  their  ten- 
derness. We  have  withheld  good  ofBces,  because 
we  knew  not  how  rare  is  the  opportunity  to  fulfil 
them.  But  when  one  whom  we  love  passes  away, 
then,  realizing  a  great  loss,  we  learn  how  vital  was 
that  relation,  how  inestimable  the  privilege  which 
is  withdrawn  forever.  How  quick  then  is  our  re- 
gret for  every  harsh  word  which  we  have  spoken 
to  the  departed,  or  for  any  momentary  alienation 
which  we  have  indulged !  This,  however,  should 
not  reduce  us  to  a  morbid  sensitiveness,  or  an 
unavailing  sorrow,  seeing  that  it  is  blended  with  so 
many  pleasant  memories;  but  it  should  teach  us  our 
duty  to  the  living.  It  should  make  our  affections 
more  diligent  and  dutiful.  It  should  check  our 
hasty  words,  and  assuage  our  passions.  It  should 
cause  us,  day  and  night,  to  meet  in  kindness  and 
part  in  peace.  Our  social  ties  are  golden  links  of 
uncertain  tenure,  and,  one  by  one,  they  drop  away. 
Let  us  cherish  a  more  constant  love  for  those  who 
make  up  our  fe,mily  circle,  for  "not  long  may  we 


212         RELATIONS    TO    THE   DEPARTED. 

stay."  The  allotments  of  duty,  perhaps,  will  soon 
distribute  us  into  different  spheres  of  action ;  our 
lines,  which  now  fall  together  in  a  pleasant  place, 
will  be  wide  apart  as  the  zones,  or  death  will  cast 
his  shadow  upon  these  familiar  faces,  and  interrupt 
our  long  communion.  Let  us,  indeed,  preserve 
this  temper  with  all  men  —  those  who  meet  us  in 
the  street,  in  the  mart,  in  the  most  casual  or  self- 
ish concerns  of  life.  We  cannot  remain  together 
a  great  while,  at  the  longest.  Let  us  meet,  then, 
with  kindness,  that  when  we  part  no  pang  may 
remain.  Let  not  a  single  day  bear  witness  to  the 
neglect  or  violation  of  any  duty  which  we  owe  to 
our  fellows.  Let  nothing  be  done  which  shall  lie 
hard  in  the  heart  when  it  is  excited  to  tender  and 
solemn  recollections.  Let  only  good-will  beam 
from  faces  that  so  soon  shall  be  changed.  Let  no 
root  of  bitterness  spring  up  in  one  man's  bosom 
against  another,  when,  ere  long,  nature  will  plant 
flowers  upon  their  common  grave.  "  Let  not  the 
sun  go  down  upon  our  wrath,"  when  his  morning 


RELATIONS    TO    THE   DEPARTED.         213 

beams  may  search  our  accustomed  places  for  one  or 
both  of  us,  in  vam. 

Thus,  if  the  dead  teach  us  to  regard  more  duti- 
fully the  living,  thej  will  accomplish  for  us  a  most 
beautiful  discipline.  Their  departure  may  also 
serve  another  end.  It  may  teach  us  the  great 
lessons  of  patience  and  resignation.  We  have 
been  surrounded  by  many  blessings,  and  yet  per- 
haps, have  indulged  in  fretfulness.  A  slight  loss 
has  irritated  us.  We  have  chafed  at  ordinary 
disappointments,  at  little  interruptions  in  the  cur- 
rent of  pur  prosperity.  We  have  been  in  the 
habit  of  murmuring.  And  now  this  great  grief 
has  overtaken  us,  that  we  may  see  at  what  little 
things  we  have  complained,  —  that  we  may  learn 
that  there  is  a  meaning  in  trouble  which  should 
make  us  calm,  —  that  we  had  no  right  to  these 
gifts,  the  privation  of  which  has  offended  us,  but 
that  all  have  flowed  from  that  mercy  which  we 
have  slightly  acknowledged,  and  peevishly  ac- 
cused.   This  great  sorrow  has  stricken  us,  piercing 


214         RELATIONS    TO    THE   DEPARTED. 

through  bone  and  marrow,  in  order  to  reach  our 
hearts,  and  touch  the  springs  of  spiritual  life  within 
us,  that  henceforth  we  may  look  upon  all  sorrow 
in  a  new  light.  Little  troubles  have  only  dis- 
turbed the  surface  of  our  nature,  making  it  un- 
easy, and  tossing  it  into  fretful  eddies ;  this  heavy 
calamity,  like  a  mighty  wind,  has  plunged  into  the 
very  depths,  and  turned  up  the  foundations,  leav- 
ing us,  at  length,  purified  and  serene.  I  believe 
we  shall  find  it  to  be  the  general  testimony  that^ 
those  who  have  the  least  trouble  are  the  loudest 
complainers  ;  while,  often,  the  souls  that  have  been 
fiiirly  swept  and  winnowed  by  sorrow  are  the  most 
patient  and  Christ-like.  The  pressure  of  their  woe 
has  broken  down  all  ordinary  reliances,  and  driven 
them  directly  to  God,  where  they  rest  in  sweet 
submission  and  in  calm  assurance.  Such  is  the 
discipline  which  may  be  wrought  out  for  us  by  the 
departure  of  those  we  love.  Such,  and  other 
spiritual  results,  their  vanishing  may  secure  for  us, 
which  we  never  could  have  gained  by  tlieir  pres- 


RELATIONS    TO    THE   DEPARTED.         215 

ence ;  and  so  it  may  be  said  by  some  departing 
friend,  —  some  one  most  dear  to  our  hearts,  —  in  a 
reverent  sense,  as  the  Master  said  to  his  disciples, 
"It  is  expedient  for  you  that  I  go  away ;  for  if  I 
go  not  away  the  Comforter  will  not  come  unto 
you." 

As  I  have  already  touched  upon  the  region  of 
speculation,  I  hardly  dare  drop  a  hint  which  be- 
longs here,  though  it  grows  out  of  a  remark  made 
under  the  last  head.  But  I  will  say  that  it  is  not 
unreasonable  to  suppose  that  the  departed  may 
perform  a  more  close  and  personal  agency  than 
this  which  I  have  just  dwelt  upon.  Often,  it  may 
be,  they  are  permitted  messengers  for  our  welfare ; 
guardians,  whose  invisible  wings  shield  us;  teach- 
ers, whose  unfelt  instructions  mysteriously  sway 
us.  The  child  may  thus  discharge  an  office  of 
more  than  filial  love  for  the  bereaved  parents. 
The  mother  may  watch  and  minister  to  her  child. 
The  father,  by  unseen  influences,  win  to  virtue 
the  heart  of  his  poor  prodigal.     But  whether  this 


216         RELATIONS    TO    THE    DEPARTED. 

be  80  or  not,  certain  are  we  that  the  departed  do 
discharge  such  an  agency,  if  not  by  spiritual  con- 
tact with  us,  or  direct  labor  in  our  behalf,  by  the 
chastening  influence  that  their  memory  sheds  upon 
us,  by  uplifting  our  thoughts,  by  spiritualizing  our 
affections,  by  drawing  our  souls  to  communion  with 
things  celestial  and  with  God. 

Let  us  see  to  it,  then,  that  we  improve  this  disci- 
pline ;  that  we  quench  not  the  holy  aspiration  which 
springs  up  in  our  sorrow ;  that  we  neglect  not  the 
opportunity  when  our  hearts  are  softened ;  that  we 
continue  the  prayer  which  first  escaped  our  lips  as  a 
sigh  and  a  call  of  distress;  that  the  baptism  of  tears 
lets  us  into  the  new  life  of  reconciliation,  and  love, 
and  holiness.  Otherwise,  the  discipline  is  of  no 
avail,  and,  it  may  be,  we  harden  under  it. 

And,  finally,  let  me  say,  that  the  faith  by  which 
we  regard  our  relations  to  the  departed  in  the 
light  that  has  been  exhibited  in  this  discourse,  is  a 
fe,ith  that  must  be  assimilated  with  our  entire 
spiritual  nature.     It   must   be   illustrated  in  our 


RELATIONS    TO    THE   DEPARTED.         217 

daily  conduct,  and  sanctify  every  thought  and 
motive  of  our  hearts.  We  should  not  seek  religion 
merely  for  its  consolations,  and  take  it  up  as  an 
occasional  remedy.  In  this  way  religion  is  in- 
jured. It  is  associated  only  with  sorrow,  and 
clothed,  to  the  eyes  of  men,  in  perpetual  sadness. 
It  is  sought  as  the  last  resort,  the  heart's  extreme 
unction,  when  it  has  tried  the  world's  nostrums  in 
vain.  It  is  dissociated  from  things  healthy  and 
active, — from  all  ordinary  experiences,  —  from  the 
great  whole  of  life.  It  is  consigned  to  the  dark- 
ened chamber  of  mourning,  and  the  weary  and  dis- 
appointed spirit.  Besides,  to  seek  religion  only  in 
sorrow — to  fly  to  it  as  the  last  refuge — argues  an 
extreme  selfishness.  We  have  served  the  world  and 
our  own  wills,  we  have  lived  the  life  of  the  senses, 
and  obeyed  the  dictates  of  our  passions  so  long  as 
they  could  satisfy  us,  and  now  we  turn  to  God 
because  we  find  that  he  only  can  avail  us !  We 
seek  religion  for  the  good  it  can  do  us,  not  for  the 
service  we  can   render   God.     We  lay  hold  of  it 


218    RELATIONS  TO  THE  DEPARTED. 

selfishly,  as  something  instituted  merely  for  our 
help,  and  lavish  our  demands  upon  it  for  consola- 
tion, turning  away  sullen  and  sceptical,  it  may  be, 
if  these  demands  are  not  immediately  answered. 
Many  come  to  religion  for  consolation  who  never 
apply  to  it  for  instruction,  for  sanctification,  for 
obedience.  Let  us  learn  that  we  can  claim  its 
privileges  only  by  performing  its  duties.  We  can 
see  with  the  eye  of  its  clear,  consoling  faith,  only 
when  it  has  spiritualized  our  entire  being,  and  been 
developed  in  our  daily  conduct.  Affliction  may 
open  religious  ideas  in  the  soul,  but  only  by  the 
soul's  discipline  will  those  ideas  expand  until  they 
become  our  most  intimate  life,  and  we  habitually 
enjoy  celestial  companionship,  and  that  supersensual 
vision  of  faith  by  which  we  learn  our  relations  to 
the  departed. 

That  faith  let  us  receive  and  cherish.  If  we 
live  it  we  shall  believe  it.  No  sophistry  can  steal 
it  from  us,  no  calamity  make  us  surrender  it.  But 
the  keener  the  trial  the  closer  will  be  our  confi- 


RELATIONS  TO   THE   DEPARTED.  219 

dence.  Standing  bj  that  open  sepulchre  in  which 
we  see  our  friends,  "  not  dead,  but  sleeping,"  we 
shall  say  to  insidious  scepticism  and  gloomy  doubt, 
in  the  earnest  words  of  the  poet, 


"  0  !  steal  not  thou  my  faith  away. 

Nor  tempt  to  doubt  a  lowly  mind. 
Make  all  that  earth  can  yield  thy  prey. 

But  leave  this  heavenly  gift  behind. 
Our  hope  is  but  the  seaboy's  dream. 

When  loud  winds  rise  in  wrath  and  gloom  ; 
Our  life,  a  faint  and  fitful  beam. 

That  lights  us  to  the  cold,  dark  tomb  ; 

"  Yet,  since,  as  one  from  heaven  has  said, 

There  lies  beyond  that  dreary  bourn 
A  region  where  the  faithful  dead 

Eternally  forget  to  mourn. 
Welcome  the  scoff,  the  sword,  the  chain. 

The  burning  waste,  the  black  abyss  :  — 
I  shrink  not  from  the  path  of  pain, 

Which  leads  me  to  that  world  of  bliss. 

"  Then  hush,  thou  troubled  heart !  be  still  ;  — 
Renounce  thy  vain  philosophy  ;  — 
Seek  thou  to  work  thy  Maker's  will, 

And  light  from  heaven  shall  break  on  thee. 


220  RELATIONS   TO    THE   DEPARTED. 

'T  will  glad  thee  in  the  weary  strife, 
Where  strong  men  sink  with  failing  breath  ;- 

'T  will  cheer  thee  in  the  noon  of  life. 
And  bless  thee  in  the  night  of  death." 


l^ottts  of  tjje  gab. 


And  by  it  he  being  dead  yet  speiikcth.    Hebbbws  xi.  4. 


y^'fJYlJCH  of  the  communion  of  this  earth  is 
JJsiy  not  by  speech  or  actual  contact,  and  the 
holiest  influences  fall  upon  us  in  silence. 
A  monument  or  symbol  shall  convey  a  meaning 
which  cannot  be  expressed;  and  a  token  of  some 
departed  one  is  more  eloquent  than  words.  The 
mere  presence  of  a  good  and  holy  personage  will 
move  us  to  reverence  and  admiration,  though  he 
may  say  and  do  but  little.  So  is  there  an  imper- 
sonal presence  of  such  an  one;  and,  though  far 
away,  he  converses  with  us,  teaches  and  incites  us. 
The  organs  of  speech  are  only  one  method  of  the 
soul's  expression ;  and  the  best  information  which 


224  VOICES    OF    THE    DEAD. 

it  receives  comes  without  voice  or  sound.  We 
hear  no  vocal  utterance  from  God,  yet  he  speaks  to 
us  through  all  the  forms  of  nature.  In  the  blue, 
over-arching  heaven  he  tells  us  of  his  comprehen- 
sive care  and  tender  pitj,  and  "  the  unwearied 
sun  "  proclaims  his  constant  and  universal  benevo- 
lence. The  air  that  wraps  us  close  breathes  of  his 
intimate  and  all-pervading  spirit ;  and  the  illimit- 
able space,  and  the  stars  that  sparkle  abroad  with- 
out number,  show  forth  his  majesty  and  suggest 
his  infinitude.  The  gush  of  silent  prayer  —  the 
sublimest  mood  of  the  spirit  —  is  when  we  are  so 
near  to  him  that  words  cannot  come  between  ;  and 
the  power  of  his  presence  is  felt  the  most,  felt  in 
the  profoundest  deep  of  our  nature,  when  the  cur- 
tains of  his  pavilion  hang  motionless  around  us. 
And  it  is  so,  I  repeat,  with  all  our  best  commun- 
ions. The  holiest  lessons  are  not  in  the  ward. 
but  the  life.  The  virtues  that  attract  us  most  are 
silent.  The  most  beautiful  charities  go  noiseless 
on  their  mission.     The  two  mites  reveal  the  sprit- 


VOICES    OF   THE  DEAD.  225 

ual  wealth  beneath  the  poor  widow's  weeds;  the 
alabaster  box  of  ointment  is  fragrant  with  Mary's 
gratitude;  the  look  of  Christ  rebukes  Peter  into 
penitence ;  and  by  his  faith  Abel,  being  dead,  yet 
speaketh. 

Yes,  even  the  dead,  long  gone  from  us,  return- 
ing no  more,  their  places  left  vacant,  their  linea- 
ments dimly  remembered,  their  bodies  mouldering 
back  to  dust,  even  these  have  communion  with  us ; 
and  to  speak  of  "the  voices  of  the  dead"  is  no 
mere  fancy.  And  it  is  to  this  subject  that  I  would 
call  your  attention,  in  the  remainder  of  a  brief 
discourse. 

"  He  being  dead  yet  speaketh."  The  departed 
have  voices  for  us.  In  order  to  illustrate  this,  I 
remark,  in  the  first  place,  that  the  dead  speak  to 
us,  and  commune  with  us,  through  the  works 
which  they  have  left  behind  them.  As  the 
islands  of  the  sea  are  the  built-up  casements  of 
myriads  of  departed  lives,  —  as  the  earth  itself  is 
a  great  catacomb,  —  so  we  who  live  and  move  upon 
15 


226  VOICES    OF    THE   DEAD. 

its  surface,  inherit  the  productions  and  enjoy  the 
fruits  of  the  dead.  They  have  bequeathed  to  us 
by  far  the  larger  portion  of  all  that  influences  our 
thoughts,  or  mingles  with  the  circumstances  of  our 
daily  life.  We  walk  through  the  streets  they  laid 
out.  We  inhabit  the  houses  they  built.  We 
practise  the  customs  they  established.  We  gather 
wisdom  from  books  they  wrote.  We  pluck  the 
ripe  clusters  of  their  experience.  We  boast  in 
their  achievements.  And  by  these  they  speak  to 
us.  Every  device  and  influence  they  have  left 
behind  tells  their  story,  and  is  a  voice  of  the  dead. 
We  feel  this  more  impressively  when  we  enter  the 
customary  place  of  one  recently  departed,  and  look 
around  upon  his  work.  The  half-finished  labor, 
the  utensils  hastily  thrown  aside,  the  material  that 
exercised  his  care  and  received  his  last  touch,  all 
express  him,  and  seem  alive  with  his  presence. 
By  them,  though  dead,  he  speaketh  to  us,  with  a 
freshness  and  tone  like  his  words  of  yesterday. 
How  touching  are  those  sketched  forms,  those  un- 


VOICES   OF   THE  DEAD.  227 

filled  outlines,  in  that  picture  which  employed  so 
fully  the  time  and  genius  of  the  great  artist  — 
Belshazzar's  feast !  In  the  incomplete  process, 
the  transition-state  of  an  idea  from  its  conception 
to  its  realization,  we  are  brought  closer  to  the 
mind  of  the  artist ;  we  detect  its  springs  and  hid- 
den workings,  and  therefore  feel  its  reality  more 
than  in  the  finished  effort.  And  this  is  one  reason 
why  we  are  more  impressed  at  beholding  the  work 
just  left  than  in  gazing  upon  one  that  has  been  for 
a  long  time  abandoned.  Having  had  actual  com- 
munion with  the  contriving  mind,  we  recognize  its 
presence  more  readily  in  its  production;  or  else 
the  recency  of  the  departure  heightens  the  expres- 
siveness with  which  everything  speaks  of  the  de- 
parted. The  dead  child's  cast-off  garment,  the  toy 
just  tossed  aside,  startles  us  as  though  with  his 
renewed  presence.  A  year  hence,  they  will  sug- 
gest him  to  us,  but  with  a  different  effect. 

But  though  not  with  such  an  impressive  tone, 
yet  just  as  much,  in  fact,  do  the  productions  of 


228  VOICES    OF    THE    DEAD. 

those  long  gone  speak  to  us.  Their  minds  are 
expressed  there,  and  a  living  voice  can  do  little 
more.  Nay,  we  are  admitted  to  a  more  intimate 
knowledge  of  them  than  was  possessed  by  their 
contemporaries.  The  work  they  leave  behind 
them  is  the  sum-total  of  their  lives  —  expresses 
their  ruling  passion  —  reveals,  perhaps,  their  real 
sentiment.  To  the  eyes  of  those  placed  on  the 
stage  with  them,  they  walked  as  in  a  show,  and 
each  life  was  a  narrative  gradually  unfolding  itself 
We  discover  the  moral.  We  see  the  results  of 
that  completed  history.  We  judge  the  quality  and 
value  of  that  life  by  the  residuum.  As  "a  prophet 
has  no  honor  in  his  own  country,"  so  one  may  be 
«  misconceived  in  his  own  time,  both  to  his  undue 
disparagement,  and  his  undue  exaltation;  there- 
fore can  another  age  better  write  his  biography 
than  his  own.  His  work,  his  permanent  result, 
speaks  for  him  better  —  at  least  truer  —  than  he 
spoke  for  himself  The  rich  man's  wealth,  —  the 
sumptuous  property,  the  golden  pile  that  he  hac 


VOICES    OF    THE    DEAD.  229 

left  behind  him ;  —  by  it,  being  dead,  deos  he  not 
yet  speak  to  us  ?  Have  we  not,  in  that  gorgeous 
result  of  toiling  days  and  anxious  nights,  —  of 
brain-sweat  and  soul-rack,  —  the  man  himself,  the 
cardinal  purpose,  the  very  life  of  his  soul  ?  which 
we  might  have  surmised  while  he  lived  and 
wrought,  but  which,  now  that  it  remains  the  whole 
sum  and  substance  of  his  mortal  being,  speaks  far 
more  emphatically  than  could  any  other  voice  he 
might  have  used.  The  expressive  lineaments  of 
the  marble,  the  pictured  canvass,  the  immortal 
poem ;  —  by  it.  Genius,  being  dead,  yet  speaketh. 
To  us,  and  not  to  its  own  time,  are  unhoarded 
the  wealth  of  its  thought  and  the  glory  of  its 
inspiration.  When  it  is  gone,  —  when  its  lips  are 
silent,  and  its  heart  still,  —  then  is  revealed  the 
cherished  secret  over  which  it  toiled,  which  was 
elaborated  from  the  living  alembic  of  the  soul, 
through  painful  days  and  weary  nights,  —  the 
sentiment  which  could  not  find  expression  to  con- 
temporaries, —  the  gift,  the  greatness,  the  lyric- 


230  VOICES   OF    THJE   DEAD. 

power,  which  was  disguised  and  unknown  so  long. 
Who,  that  has  communed  with  the  work  of  such 
a  spirit,  has  not  felt  in  every  line  that  thrilled  his 
soul,  in  every  wondrous  lineament  that  stamped 
itself  upon  his  memory  forever,  that  the  dead  can 
speak,  yea,  that  they  have  voices  which  speak  most 
truely,  most  emphatically,  when  they  are  dead? 
So  does  Industry  speak,  in  its  noble  monuments, 
its  precious  fruits !  So  does  Maternal  Affection 
speak,  in  a  chord  that  vibrates  in  the  hardest  heart, 
in  the  pure  and  better  sentiment  of  after-years. 
So  does  Patriotism,  speak,  in  the  soil  liberated  and 
enriched  by  its  sufferings.  So  does  the  martyr 
speak,  in  the  truth  which  triumphs  by  his  sacrifice. 
So  does  the  great  man  speak,  in  his  life  and  deeds, 
glowing  on  the  storied  page.  So  does  the  good 
m,an  speak,  in  the  character  and  influence  which 
he  leaves  behind  him.  The  voices  of  the  dead 
come  to  us  from  their  works,  from  their  results; 
and  these  are  all  around  us. 

But  I  remark,  in  the   second   place,  that  the 


VOICES    OF    THE   DEAD.  231 

dead  speak  to  us  in  memory  and  association.  If 
their  voices  may  be  constantly  heard  in  their 
works,  we  do  not  always  heed  them ;  neither  have 
we  that  care  and  attachment  for  the  great  congre- 
gation of  the  departed  which  will  at  any  time  call 
them  up  vividly  before  us.  But  in  that  congrega- 
tion there  are  those  whom  we  have  known  inti- 
mately and  fondly,  whom  we  cherished  with  our 
best  love,  who  lay  close  to  our  bosoms.  And  these 
speak  to  us  in  a  more  private  and  peculiar  manner, 
—  in  mementos  that  flash  upon  us  the  whole  per- 
son of  the  departed,  every  physical  and  spiritual 
lineament  —  in  consecrated  hours  of  recollection 
that  open  up  all  the  train  of  the  past,  and  re-twine 
its  broken  ties  around  our  hearts,  and  make  its 
endearments  present  still.  Then,  then,  though 
dead,  they  speak  to  us.  It  needs  not  the  vocal 
utterance,  nor  the  living  presence,  but  the  mood 
that  transforms  the  scene  and  the  hour  supplies 
these.  That  face  that  has  slept  so  long  in  the 
grave,  now  bending  upon  us,  pale  and  silent,  but 


232  VOICES   OF   THE  DEAD. 

affectionate  still,  —  that  more  vivid  recollection  of 
every  feature,  tone,  and  movement,  that  brings 
before  us  the  departed  just  as  we  knew  them  in 
the  full  flush  of  life  and  health,  —  that  soft  and 
consecrating  spell  which  falls  upon  us,  drawing  in 
all  our  thoughts  from  the  present,  arresting,  as  it 
were,  the  current  of  our  being,  and  turning  it  back 
and  holding  it  still  as  the  flood  of  actual  life  rushes 
by  us, —  while  in  that  trance  of  soul  the  beings  of 
the  past  are  shadowed  —  old  friends,  old  days,  old 
scenes  recur,  familiar  looks  beam  close  upon  us,  fa- 
miliar words  reecho  in  our  ears,  and  we  are  closed 
up  and  absorbed  with  the  by-gone,  until  tears  dis- 
solve the  film  from  our  eyes,  and  some  shock  of  the 
actual  wakes  us  from  our  reverie ;  —  all  these,  I 
say,  make  the  dead  to  commune  with  us  as  really 
as  though  in  bodily  form  they  should  come  out 
from  the  chambers  of  their  mysterious  silence,  and 
speak  to  us.  And  if  life  consists  in  experiences, 
and  not  mere  physical  relations,  — '  and  if  love  and 
communion  belong  to  that  experience,  though  they 


VOICES   OF   THE   DEAD.  233 

take  place  in  meditation,  or  dreams,  or  bj  actual 
contact,  —  then,  in  that  hour  of  remembrance,  have 
we  really  lived  with  the  departed,  and  the  departed 
have  come  back  and  lived  with  us.  Though  dead, 
they  have  spoken  to  us.  And  though  memory 
sometimes  induces  the  spirit  of  heaviness, — though 
it  is  often  the  agent  of  conscience,  and  wakens  us 
to  chastise, — yet,  it  is  wonderful  how,  from  events 
that  were  deeply  mingled  with  pain,  it  will  extract 
an  element  of  sweetness.  A  writer,  in  relatinsr 
one  of  the  experiences  of  her  sick-room,  has  illus- 
trated this.  In  an  hour  of  suffering,  when  no  one 
was  near  her,  she  went  from  her  bed  and  her  room 
to  another  apartment,  and  looked  out  upon  a  glori- 
ous landscape  of  sunrise  and  spring-time.  "  I  was 
suffering  too  much  to  enjoy  this  picture  at  the  mo- 
ment," she  says,  "  but  how  was  it  at  the  end  of 
the  year  ?  The  pains  of  all  those  hours  were  an- 
nihilated, —  as  completely  vanished  as  if  they  had 
never  been ;  while  the  momentary  peep  behind  the 
window-curtain  made  me  possessor  of  this  radiant 


234  VOICES    OF    THE   DEAD. 

picture  for  evermore."  "  Whence  this  wide  differ- 
ence," she  asks,  "  between  the  good  and  the  evil? 
Because  the  good  is  indissolubly  connected  with 
ideas,  —  with  the  unseen  realities  which  are  inde- 
structible." And  though  the  illustration  which 
she  thus  gives  may  bear  the  impression  of  an 
individual  peculiarity,  instead  of  a  universal  truth, 
still,  in  the  instance  to  which  I  apply  it,  I  believe 
it  will  very  generally  hold  true,  that  memory 
leaves  a  pleasant  rather  than  a  painful  impression. 
At  least,  there  is  so  much  that  is  pleasant  mingled 
with  it  that  we  would  not  willingly  lose  the  fac- 
ulty of  memory,  —  the  consciousness  that  we  can 
thus  call  back  the  dead,  and  hear  their  voices,  — 
that  we  have  the  power  of  softening  the  rugged 
realities  which  only  suggest  our  loss  and  disap- 
pointment, by  transferring  the  scene  and  the  hour 
to  the  past  and  the  departed.  And,  as  our  con- 
ceptions become  more  and  more  spiritual,  we  shall 
find  the  real  to  be  less  dependent  upon  the  out- 
ward and  the  visible,  —  we  shall  learn  how  much 


VOICES    OF   THE   DEAD.  235 

life  there  is  in  a  thought,  —  how  veritable  are  the 
communions  of  spirit ;  and  the  hour  in  which  mem- 
ory gives  us  the  voices  of  the  dead  will  be  prized 
by  us  as  an  hour  of  actual  experience,  and  such 
opportunities  will  grow  more  precious  to  us.  No, 
we  would  not  willingly  lose  this  power  of  memory. 
One  would  not  say,  "  Let  the  dead  never  come 
back  to  me  in  a  thought,  or  a  dream;  let  them 
never  glide  before  me  in  the  still  watch  of  medita- 
tion ;  let  me  see,  let  me  hear  them  no  more,  even 
in  fancy;"  —  not  one  of  us  would  say  this;  and, 
therefore,  it  is  evident,  that  whatever  painful  cir- 
cumstance memory  or  association  may  recall,  — 
even  though  it  cause  us  to  go  out  and  weep  bit- 
terly,— there  is  a  sacred  pleasure,  a  tender  melan- 
choly, that  speaks  to  us  in  these  voices  of  the  dead, 
which  we  are  willing  to  cherish  and  repeat.  It 
makes  our  tears  soft  and  sanctifying  as  they  fall ; 
it  makes  our  hearts  purer  and  better,  —  makes 
them  stronger  for  the  conflict  of  life. 

I  remark,  finally,  that  the  dead  speak  to  us  in 


236  VOICES    OF   THE   DEAD. 

those  religious  suggestions  —  those  consolations, 
invitations,  and  hopes — which  the  bereaved  spirit 
indulges.  Our  meditations,  concerning  them  nat- 
urally draw  us  more  closely  to  those  spiritual 
realities  which  lie  beyond  the  grave,  and  beget  in 
us  those  holier  sentiments  which  we  need.  That 
such  is  the  tendency  of  these  recollections  experi- 
ence assures  us.  They  open  for  us  a  new  order  of 
thought ;  they  bring  us  in  contact  with  the  loftiest 
but  most  neglected  truths.  Even  the  hardest 
heart  feels  this  influence.  It  is  softened  by  the 
stroke  of  bereavement,  and,  for  the  time  being,  a 
chastening  influence  falls  upon  it,  and  it  always 
thinks  of  the  dead  with  tenderness  and  awe. 
They  speak  to  our  afiections  with  an  irresistible 
influence  ;  they  soothe  our  turbulent  passions  with 
their  mild  and  holy  calmness;  they  rebuke  us 
in  their  spiritual  majesty  for  our  sensuality  and 
our  sin.  They  have  departed,  but  they  are  not 
silent.  Though  dead,  they  speak  to  us.  Sweet 
and  sanctifying  is  their  communion  with  us.    They 


VOICES    OF   THE   DEAD.  237 

utter  words  of  warning,  too,  and  speak  to  us  by  the 
silent  eloquence  of  example.  By  this  they  bid  us 
imitate  all  that  was  good  in  their  lives,  all  that  is 
dear  to  remember.  By  this,  too,  they  tell  us  that 
we  are  passing  swiftly  from  the  earth,  and  hasten- 
ing to  join  their  number.  A  little  while  ago,  and 
they  were  as  we  are  ;  —  a  little  while  hence,  and 
we  shall  be  as  they.  Our  work,  like  theirs,  will 
be  lefb  behind  to  speak  for  us.  How  important, 
then,  that  we  consider  what  work  we  do !  They 
assure  us  that  nothing  is  perpetual  here.  They 
bid  us  not  fasten  our  affections  upon  earth.  In 
long  procession  they  pass  us  by,  with  solemn  voices 
telling  of  their  love  and  hatred,  their  interests  and 
cares,  their  work  and  device ;  —  all  abandoned  now 
and  passed  away,  as  little  worth  as  the  dust  that 
blows  across  their  graves.  Upon  all  that  was 
theirs,  upon  every  memorial  of  them,  broods  a 
melancholy  dimness  and  silence.  They  recede 
more  and  more  from  the  associations  of  the  living. 
New  tides  of  life  roll  through  the  cities  of  their 


238  VOICES    OF    THE    DEAD. 

habitation,  and  upon  the  foot- worn  pavements  of 
their  traffic  other  feet  are  busy.  Their  lowly 
labor,  or  their  stately  pomp,  is  forgotten.  No  one 
weeps  or  cares  for  them.  Their  solicitous  monu- 
ments are  unheeded.  The  companions  of  their 
youth  have  rejoined  them.  The  young,  who 
scarcely  remembered  them,  are  giving  way  to 
another  generation.  The  places  that  knew  them 
know  them  no  longer.  "  This,  this,"  their  solemn 
voices  preach  to  us,  "is  the  changeableness  of 
earth,  and  the  emptiness  of  its  pursuits  !  "  They 
urge  us  to  seek  the  noblest  end,  the  unfailing 
treasure.  They  bid  us  find  our  hope  and  our 
rest,  our  only  constant  joy,  in  Him,  who  alone, 
amid  this  mutability  and  decay,  is  permanent,  — 
in  God  ! 

Well,  then,  is  it  for  us  to  listen  to  the  voices  of 
the  dead.  By  so  doing,  we  are  better  fitted  for 
life,  and  for  death.  From  that  audience  we  go 
purified  and  strengthened  into  the  varied  discipline 
of  our  mortal  state.      We   are  willing   to   stay. 


VOICES    OF    THE   DEAD.  239 

knowing  that  the  dead  are  so  near  us,  and  that 
our  communion  with  them  may  be  so  intimate. 
We  are  willing  to  go.  seeing  that  we  shall  not  be 
wholly  separated  from  those  we  leave  behind.  We 
will  toil  in  our  lot  while  God  pleases,  and  when  he 
summons  us  we  will  calmly  depart.  When  the 
silver  cord  becomes  untwined,  and  the  golden  bowl 
broken,  —  when  the  wheel  of  action  stands  still  in 
the  exhausted  cistern  of  our  life,  —  may  we  lie 
down  in  the  light  of  that  faith  which  makes  so 
beautiful  the  face  of  the  dying  Christian,  and  has 
converted  death's  ghastly  silence  to  a  peaceful 
sleep ;  may  we  rise  to  a  holier  and  more  visible 
communion,  in  the  land  without  a  sin  and  without 
a  tear ;  where  the  dead  shall  be  closer  to  us  than 
in  this  life ;  where  pot  the  partition  of  a  shadow, 
or  a  doubt,  shall  come  between. 


18 


^jsti^rj  aitb  J|ait|, 


For  we  walk  by  bdth,  not  by  sight.    11  Corinthians  v.  7. 


fT  needs  only  common  experience,  and  but 
little  of  that,  to  convince  us  that  this  life  is 
full  of  mystery,  and  at  every  step  we  take  de- 
mands of  us  faith.  For  at  every  step  we  take  we 
literally  walk  by  faith ;  in  every  work  we  do  we 
must  have  confidence  in  something  which  is  not  by 
sight,  in  something  which  is  not  yet  demonstrated. 
Skepticism  carried  to  its  ultimate  consequences  is 
the  negation  of  everything.  It  closes  up  the  issues 
of  all  knowledge,  and  sundei-s  every  ligament  that 
binds  us  to  practical  life.  We  must  have  faith  in 
something  or  we  stand  on  no  premises;  we  can 
predicate  nothing.     It  may  be  said  that  in  the  ex- 


244  MYSTERY   AND    FAITH. 

perience  of  the  past  we  have  a  guide  for  the  future ; 
but  then,  must  we  not  have  faith  in  experience  ? 
Do  we  not  trust  something  which  is  not  yet  demon- 
strated when  we  say,  "  This  cause  which  produced 
that  effect  yesterday  will  produce  a  similar  effect 
to-day  or  to-morrow  ?  "  How  do  we  know  —  posi- 
tively know^  that  it  will  produce  that  effect,  and 
what  are  the  grounds  of  our  knowledge?  This 
boasted  "cause  and  effect,"  this  ''experience,"  what 
right  have  we  to  rely  upon  it  for  one  moment  of  the 
future  ?  Not  for  that  moment  has  it  demonstrated 
anything ;  —  it  demonstrated  for  the  time  being, 
and  for  the  time  being  only ;  and  our  confidence 
that  it  will  do  so  again  is  faith,  not  sight  —  faith 
in  cause  and  effect,  faith  in  experience,  but  faith 
after  all.  Hume,  the  philosopher,  has  illustrated 
the  positions  which  have  now  been  taken.  "As  to 
past  experience,"  says  he,  "  it  can  be  allowed  to 
give  direct  and  certain  information  of  those  precise 
objects  only,  and  that  precise  period  of  time  which 
fell  under  its  cognizance ;  but  why  this  experience 


MYSTERY   AND    FAITH.  245 

should  be  extended  to  future  times,  and  to  other 
objects,  which  for  aught  we  know  may  be  only  in 
appearance  similar;  this  is  the  main  question  on 
which  I  would  insist.  The  bread  which  I  formerly 
ate  nourished  me ;  that  is,  a  body  of  such  sensible 
qualities  was,  at  that  time,  endued  with  such  secret 
powers ;  but  does  it  follow  that  other  bread  must 
also  nourish  me  at  another  time,  and  that  like  sen- 
sible qualities  must  also  be  attended  with  like  secret 
powers?  The  consequence  seems  nowise  neces- 
sary." And  yet  we  eat  our  bread,  day  by  day, 
without  a  doubt  or  a  fear.  We  sow  the  grain  and 
we  reap  the  wheat,  but  all  the  work  is  done  in 
faith,  and  the  whole  process  is  steeped  in  mystery. 
In  that  scattering  of  the  golden  seed,  what  confi- 
dence is  expressed  in  elements  that  we  cannot  see, 
in  beneficent  agencies  that  we  cannot  control,  in  re- 
sults that  are  beyond  our  power,  and  that  in  their 
growth  and  development  are  full  of  wonder  exceed- 
ing our  wisdom.  Give  up  faith ;  say  that  we  will 
act  only  upon  that  which  is  demonstrated  and  known, 


246  MYSTERY   AND    FAITH. 

saj  that  we  will  walk  onlj  so  far  as  sight  reaches, 
and  we  completely  separate  the  present  from  the  fu- 
ture, and  stop  all  the  mechanism  of  practical  life. 

But  if  we  take  a  wider  view  of  things,  and  con- 
sider this  material  universe  in  which  we  live,  the 
great  fact  of  mystery  and  the  need  of  faith  will  be 
urged  upon  us  by  a  larger  and  more  impressive 
teaching.  The  more  we  learn  of  nature  the  more 
clearly  is  revealed  to  us  this  &ct  —  that  we  know 
less  than  we  thought  we  did ;  positively,  we  know 
more,  but  relatively  we  know  less,  because  as  we 
have  advanced  nature  has  stretched  out  into  wider 
and  wider  relations.  The  department  that  was  un- 
known to  us  yesterday  is  explored  to-day.  Yester- 
day, we  thought  it  was  all  that  remained  to  be 
explored,  but  the  torch  of  investigation  that  guided 
us  through  it  now  flares  out  upon  new  regions  Ave 
did  not  see  before.  Like  one  who  goes  with  a  can- 
dle into  some  immense  cavern,  presently  a  little 
circle  becomes  clear,  the  shadows  vanish  before  him, 
and  undefined  forms  grow  distinct.    He  thinks  he  is 


MYSTERY   AND    FAITH.  247 

near  the  end,  when  lo !  what  seemed  a  solid  bound- 
ary of  rock  dissolves  and  floats  away  into  a  depth 
of  darkness,  the  path  opens  into  an  immense  void, 
new  shapes  of  mystery  start  out,  and  he  learns  this 
much  that  he  did  not  know  before,  that  instead  of 
being  near  the  end,  he  is  only  upon  the  threshold. 
We  do  not  mean  to  imply  by  this  that  we  have  no 
positive  knowledge,  or  that  we  do  not  increase  in 
knowledge.  With  every  new  discovery  we  posi- 
tively know  more  and  more.  But  the  new  discov- 
ery reveals  the  fact  that  more  is  yet  to  be  known ; 
it  lays  open  new  regions,  it  unfolds  new  relations 
that  we  had  not  before  suspected. 

We  follow  some  tiny  thread  a  little  way,  and 
hold  it  secure,  but  it  is  connected  with  another 
ligament,  and  this  branches  out  into  a  third ;  and, 
instead  of  exhausting  the  matter,  we  find  ourselves 
at  the  root  of  an  infinite  series,  of  an  immense  re- 
lationship, upon  which  we  have  only  just  opened ; 
and  yet  what  we  have  is  positive  knowledge,  is 
something  more  added  to  our  stock.     The  circle  of 


248  MYSTERY   AND    FAITH. 

the  known  has  positively  widened,  but  the  horizon 
of  the  unknown  has  widened  also,  and,  instead  of 
being  to  us  now,  as  it  seemed  some  time  ago,  a  solid 
and  ultimate  limit,  it  is  only  an  ethereal  wall,  only 
to  us  a  relative  boundary,  and  behind  are  infinite 
depths  and  mystery.  Our  scientific  knowledge  at 
the  present  day  reaches  this  grand  result  —  it  clears 
up  the  deception  that  the  system  of  nature  is  mere 
flat,  dead  materiality,  a  few  mechanical  laws,  a  few 
rigid  forms.  It  shows  that  these  are  only  the 
husks,  the  outer  garments  of  mighty  forces,  of  sub- 
tile, far-reaching  agencies  ;  and  the  most  common, 
every-day  truths,  that  seemed  stale  and  exhausted, 
become  illuminated  with  infinite  meaning,  and  are 
the  blossoms  of  an  infinite  life. 

The  wider  our  circle  of  discovery,  the  wider  our 
wonder;  the  more  startling  our  conclusions,  the 
more  perplexing  our  questions.  We  have  not  ex- 
hausted the  universe ;  —  we  have  just  begun  to  see 
its  harmony  of  proportion  and  of  relations,  without 
penetrating  a  fathom  into  its  real  life.     How  and 


MYSTERY  AND    FAITH.  249 

what  is  that  power  that  works  m  the  shooting  of 
a  crystal,  and  binds  the  obedience  of  a  star;  that 
shimmers  in  the  northern  Aurora,  and  connects  by 
its  attraction  the  aggregated  universe ;  that  by  its 
unseen  forces,  its  all-prevalent  jurisdiction,  holds 
the  little  compass  to  the  north,  blooms  in  the  nebula 
and  the  flower,  weaves  the  garment  of  earth  and 
the  veil  of  heaven,  darts  out  in  lightning,  spins  the 
calm  motion  of  the  planets,  and  presides  mysteri- 
ously over  all  motion  and  all  life  ?  And  what  is 
life,  and  what  is  death,  and  what  a  thousand  things 
that  we  touch,  and  experience,  and  think  we  know 
all  about  ?  0 !  as  science,  as  nature  opens  upon 
us,  we  find  mystery  after  mystery,  and  the  demand 
upon  the  human  soul  is  for  faith,  faith  in  high,  yea, 
in  spiritual  realities;  and  this  materialism  that  would 
shut  us  in  to  death  and  sense,  that  denies  all  spirit 
and  all  mu*acle,  is  shattered  like  a  crystal  sphere, 
and  the  soul  rushes  out  into  wide  orbits  and  infinite 
revolutions,  into  life,  and  light,  and  power,  that  are 
of  eternity,  —  that  are  of  God ! 


250  MYSTERY"   AND    FAITH. 

Thus  the  scale  is  prepared  for  us  to  rise  from 
things  of  sense  to  things  of  spirit,  to  rise  from  faith 
in  nature  to  faith  in  Revelation,  from  the  faith  of 
La  Place  to  the  feith  of  Paul.  No  one  who  has 
studied  nature  aright  will  reject  Christianity  be- 
cause it  reveals  truths  that  he  cannot  see  with  his 
naked  eje,  —  because  it  speaks  of  things  that  he 
cannot  comprehend.  No  one  who  has  considered 
the  shooting  of  a  green  blade  will  dogmatically  deny 
its  miracles.  No  one  who  has  found  in  the  natural 
world  the  intelligent  wisdom  that  pervades  all 
things,  will  wonder  that  he  discovers  a  revelation 
of  perfect  love  in  Jesus  Christ.  "We  walk  by 
faith,  not  by  sight,"  said  Paul.  So  says  every 
Christian ;  and  it  is  of  all  things  most  rational. 
Faith  in  something  higher  and  greater  than  we  can 
see,  faith  in  something  above  this  narrow  scene, 
faith  in  something  beyond  this  present  life,  faith  in 
realities  that  are  not  of  time  or  sense ;  from  all  that 
we  have  now  considered  we  claim  such  faith  to  be 
most  rational,  most  natural.     God,  spirit,  immor- 


MYSTERY   AND    FAITH.  251 

tality,  instead  of  being  inconsistent  with  what  we 
know,  are  what  we  might  most  legitimately  deduce 
from  it,  —  what  we  might  expect  from  the  light 
that  trembles  behind  that  curtain  of  mystery  which 
bounds  all  our  sensuous  knowledge.  We  do  be- 
lieve, the  veriest  skeptic  believes,  in  something 
behind  that  curtain  of  mystery ;  nor  can  he  with- 
hold his  faith  because  it  attaches  to  that  which  is 
unseen  and  incomprehensible,  without,  as  has  al- 
ready been  shown,  cutting  every  nerve  that  binds 
us  to  practical  life,  and  smothering  every  sugges- 
tion that  speaks  from  outward  nature.  If  he  do  not 
believe  in  a  God,  then,  or  in  Christ,  or  in  immor- 
tality, let  him  not  sneer  at  others  because  they 
walk  by  feith  and  not  by  sight ;  for  he  also  must 
do  so,  though  his  faith  be  not  in  such  high  truths, 
such  spiritual  realities. 

The  Christian's  faith  is  in  an  Infinite  Father  and 
an  immortal  life,  and  though  he  cannot  see  them, 
cannot  come  in  material  contact  with  them,  he  be- 
lieves them  to  be  the  greatest  of  realities,  and  he 


252  MYSTERY   AND    FAITH. 

sees  them  bj  faith,  a  medium  as  legitimate  as  that 
of  sight.  They  are  mysteries,  but  everything  con- 
tains a  mystery  ;  they  demand  of  him  what  every 
day's,  every  hour's  events  demand  of  him  —  faith. 
Let  us  understand,  however,  that  faith  is  not  the 
surrendering  of  our  minds  to  that  which  is  irrational 
and  inconsistent.  These  terms  should  not  be  con- 
founded with  the  mysterious  and  the  incomprehen- 
sible. That  the  earth  moves  and  yet  stands  still  is 
not  a  proposition  that  demands  faith.  It  is  in  the 
province  of  reason  to  say  that  it  cannot  move  and 
stand  still  at  the  same  time.  It  is  an  inconsistency. 
But  how  the  earth  moves  on  its  axis,  what  is  that 
law  that  makes  it  move,  is  an  incomprehensibility. 
An  incomprehensibility  is  one  thing,  an  inconsist- 
ency is  another  thing.  The  one  conflicts  with  our 
reason,  the  other  is  beyond  it.  In  that  which  con- 
flicts with  our  reason  we  cannot  have  faith,  but  as 
to  that  which  is  beyond  it  we  exercise  faith  every 
day;  for  we  literally  walk  by  faith  and  not  by 
sight. 


MYSTERY  AND    FAITH.  253 

Who  shall  say,  then,  that  God,  immortality,  and 
those  high  truths  revealed  by  Jesus,  are  inconsist- 
ent ?  Do  they  not  conform  to  our  highest  reason  ? 
Do  not  our  deepest  intuitions  demand  that  these 
revelations  should  be  true  ?  Consult  your  nature, 
examine  your  own  heart,  consider  what  you  are, 
Avhat  you  want,  what  you  feel,  deeply  want,  keenly 
feel,  and  then  say  whether  the  Revelation  of  a  God, 
a  Father,  and  an  immortal  life,  satisfies  you  as 
nothing  else  can.  Take  them  away,  and  would 
there  not  be  a  dreary  and  overwhelming  void? 
And  because  you  have  not  seen  God,  because  you 
have  not  realized  immortality,  because  they  reach 
beyond  your  present  vision,  because  the  grave  shuts 
you  in,  because  they  are  high  and  transcendent 
truths,  will  you  reject  them  ?  Do  so,  and  try  to 
walk  by  sight  alone.  With  that  nature  of  yours, 
so  full  of  love,  with  that  intellect  of  yours  so  limit- 
less in  capacity,  you  are  apparently  a  child  of  the 
elements,  a  thing  of  physical  nature,  born  of  the 
dust,  and  returning  to  it.     With  desires  that  reach 


254  MYSTERY   AND    FAITH. 

out  beyond  the  stars,  with  faculties  that  in  this  life 
just  begin  to  bud,  with  affections  whose  bleeding 
tendrils  cling  around  the  departed,  wrestle  with 
death,  and  say  to  the  grave,  "  Give  up  the  dead ! 
they  are  not  thine,  but  mine ;  I  feel  they  must  be 
mine  forever,"  with  all  these  desires,  capacities, 
affections,  you  walk  —  so  far  as  mere  sight  helps 
you  —  among  graves  and  decay,  with  nothing  more 
enduring,  nothing  better,  than  three-score  years  and 
ten,  the  clods  of  the  valley,  the  crumbling  bone, 
and  the  dissolving  dust !  Because  God  and  immor- 
tality are  mysterious,  incomprehensible,  reject  them, 
and  walk  only  by  sight  ?  The  humblest  outpour- 
ing of  human  affection  rebukes  thy  skepticism ;  the 
most  narrow  degree  of  human  intellect  prophesies 
beyond  all  this ;  the  darkest  heart,  with  that  spark 
of  eternal  life,  the  yearning  that  moves  beneath  all 
its  sensualities,  and  speaks  for  better,  for  more  en- 
during things,  —  that  rebukes  thee ;  and  in  man's 
moral  nature,  in  his  heart  and  his  mind,  there  is 
that  which  only  can  be  satisfied,  only  can  be  ex- 


9 

MYSTERY   AND   FAITH.  255 

plained  by  God  and  immortality.  They  alone, 
then,  are  rational,  they  alone  have  comprehensive 
vision,  who  walk  by  faith,  and  not  by  sight. 

Mystery  and  faith,  then ;  let  what  we  have  said 
concerning  these  be  not  alone  for  the  skeptic,  but 
for  the  Christian  who  has  faith  but  cannot  fully 
justify  and  confirm  it,  or  who  feels  it  faltering  un- 
der some  heavy  burden,  or  who  is  overwhelmed  by 
the  magnitude  of  the  truths  to  which  it  attaches,  or 
who  wishes,  with  a  kind  of  half-doubt,  that  these 
things  might  be  seen  and  felt.  They  are  great, 
they  are  incomprehensibly  great;  but  are  they 
therefore  untrue  ?  Does  not  your  heart  of  hearts 
tell  you  they  are  true  ?  Does  not  that  Revelation 
of  Christ  steal  into  your  soul  and  feed  it,  satisfy  it, 
as  nothing  else  can,  with  a  warm,  benignant  power, 
that  makes  you  know  its  truth  ? 

Mysteries  are  all  about  us,  but  faith  sees  light 
beyond  and  around  them  all.  Have  you  recently 
laid  down  the  dead  in  their  place  of  rest  ?  Cold 
and  crushing,  then,  is  that  feeling  of  vacancy,  that 


256  MYSTERY    AND    FAITH. 

dreary  sense  of  loss,  that  rushes  upon  you,  as  you 
look  through  the  desolate  chambers  without,  — 
through  the  desolate  chambers  of  the  heart  within. 
But  will  not  He  who  calls  out  from  the  very  dust 
where  yon  sleepers  lie  the  flowers  of  summer,  and 
who,  in  the  snows  that  enwrap  their  bed,  cherishes 
the  germs  of  the  glorious  springtime,  will  not  He 
who  works  out  this  beautiful  mystery  in  nature 
bring  life  from  the  tomb,  and  light  out  of  darkness? 
It  is  truly  a  great  mystery ;  but  everything  within 
us  responds  to  it  as  reasonable ;  and  though  it  de- 
mands our  faith,  who,  who,  in  this  limited  and 
changing  world,  can  walk  by  sight  alone  ? 


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